Apse chapel

As chapels chapels are called, which are arranged in a church by a semi-circular or polygonal choir or an ambulatory. They are also individually referred to as a ring or radial chapel chapel. The middle band is called vertex chapel.

The chapels is usually to be found in medieval churches in union with an ambulatory, especially in pilgrimage churches, for example, on the road to Santiago de Compostela. In historic pilgrimage churches, the chapels to go out on the opposite side aisle again can serve the processions often numerous in the Middle Ages pilgrims who entered one of the aisles, then to the choir around and. In this case, they went often pass numerous issued on altars in chapels relics, to whose worship they had come. Not least, these have contributed to the generosity of the pilgrims.

The accumulation of the chapels in historic churches resulted from the fact if they belonged to a monastic community whose pastors had to be provided a sufficient number of altars available so that they could fulfill their obligation to the celebration of religious services. Are known within various churches chapel species, such as choir, parietal, rim, side aisle, side and votive chapels.

The number of chapels of a ring is different and depends on the size of the chevet. They often hold each other more or less wide gaps where the outer wall is dealing piecewise visible and in which individual windows are usually spared. In other cases they encounter directly against each other, such as the Cologne Cathedral.

Radiating chapels are mostly on semi-circular floor plans, which are sometimes extended in the direction of dealing by short rectangles. Your most semi-circular outer walls go over into corresponding part vault. In the Romanesque period are predominantly spherical cups half and half domes that may be expanded with short barrel vaults. In Gothic there are half a ribbed vault. They are always exposed by one or more windows.

The Romanesque churches with ambulatory and radiating chapels include, for example: Notre -Dame- du- Port de Clermont- Ferrand, St-Etienne de Nevers, Notre- Dame de Châtel -Montagne to the strong presence Gothic churches of Cologne Cathedral and others.