Dublin Core
Title
Gargoyles
Identifier
120
Symbol Item Type Metadata
Symbol name
Gargoyles
Symbol Description
Gargoyles, or monstrous carved heads and bodies, originally were used as waterspouts on sacred buildings. They were also believed to ward off evil spirits through their monstrous appearance. They were used as early as in Classical Greece.
Gargoyles gradually became very ornamental, humourous and inventive. Most were carved between the 10th and 15th centuries in Western Europe.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux, (12th-century France) said of gargoyles :
"What are these fantastic monsters doing in the cloisters under the very eyes of the brothers as they read? What is the meaning of these unclean monkeys, strange savage lions and monsters? To what purpose are here placed these creatures, half beast, half man? I see several bodies with one head and several heads with one body. Here is a quadruped with a serpent's head, there a fish with a quadruped's head, then again an animal half horse, half goat... Surely if we do not blush for such absurdities we should at least regret what we have spent on them."
Sources
Cipa, p. 4-7.