Aachen - Cathedral

The "Imperial Cathedral" was known as the "Royal Church of St. Mary at Aachen" during the Middle Ages. From 936 to 1531, the Aachen chapel was the church of coronation for 30 German kings and
12 queens.

In 792 Charlemagne ("Charles the Great", "Karl der Grosse") began the construction of a palace here and part of the whole structure was this "Palatine Chapel". The center (and the oldest part) of the cathedral of today is this carolingian octogon, planned are realized by Odo of Metz, one of the first known architects, north of the Alps. Odo had seen obviously seen Byzantine churches. For sure he knew details of the Basilica of San Vitale of Ravenna, as San Vitale, that seems to be a model of this chapel.

Pope Leo III consecrated the chappel in 805.

The architecture of the octogon a real hefty "power demonstration". In 805 this construction was probably near to a heavenly miracle.

Standing in the center - looking up.
It is known, that under the dome was a mosaic or fresco showing a scene from the "Apocalypse of John". The 24 oldest kings give their crowns to Christ, who is surrounded by the symbols of the evangelists. The version we see today was done 1880/81.

Yes, 1/8 of the octogon is uner renovation and hidden ander a plastic cover
- and there is something hanging down. Click on the next photo to see, what it is.


The cathedral has a very nice website - in German:
www.aachendom.de/

Wikipedia has one
in English: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aachen_Cathedral
and French: fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cath%C3%A9drale_d%27Aix-la-Chapelle