Abstract

A rich and long-standing historiographical tradition has explained the twelfth-century Romanesque portal of Saint-Pierre Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne through the lens of the struggle against heresy, connecting its monumental imagery with the writings of the abbot of Cluny, Peter the Venerable, specifically his Adversus Iudeos and Contra Petrobrusianos.
In this article, the unusual program of the portal is explored in light of Cluniac liturgical readings, namely those transmitted by the late eleventh-century lectionary used at Cluny (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, NAL 2246), and other coeval sources. It is argued that the portal, informed by Cluniac liturgical readings, was not only conceived as a visual progression from Lent to Easter, but that possibly it was intended as a sort of mirror, in which the liturgy performed in front of it resonated and was amplified, unveiling its intimate eschatological meaning.