This Romanesque stone portal ornamented the main entrance of the Abbey Church of Saint-Laurent, a monastery near the Loire River in central France, on one of the pilgrimage roads to the shrine of Santiago de Compostela in Spain. The most active period of the community followed the 1080s, when it was reorganized by Augustinian monks who initiated construction in the 1100s. The monastery was attacked and significantly damaged in local warfare in the 1440s. By the mid-nineteenth century only the transept, or cross-section, was still in use, the rest having been sold to local farmers, who in turn sold pieces to French art dealers. In 1993, the church as it now exists was designated a French historic monument.
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The arch and the three-part columns consisting of a base, shaft, and capital that comprise the portal are adapted from ancient Roman architecture, from which the Romanesque style derives its name. Here, however, these elements are put to new uses, for arches are grouped within arches, and vigorous abstract patterns are carved into their surfaces, as capitals became the focus for a host of new motifs and symbols. The rich ornamentation of this portal was influenced by the style of the greatest Benedictine monastery in all of Europe, Cluny, which had founded a large church, La Charite-sur-Loire, near Saint-Laurent. In its original site, the elaborate decoration of the Museum's doorway was in sharp contrast to the plain walls and simple volumes of the rest of the church.
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