r German cathedrals, such as Speyer's, featured extended naves with very high walls consisting of long rows of arches with extremely thick piers and second-floor galleries. The cathedral at Speyer also, as early as 1030, featured an "imposing groin-vaulted crypt but the original nave roof was a flat timber construction." It was not until the turn of the century, however, that the alternate piers were strengthened to carry the series of groin vaults, separated with transverse arches, that replaced the timber ceiling. Watkin argues that this was probably the original plan--though it appears that the builders had not yet been able to gauge the strength of construction needed to support the weight of the vaults. But the cathedral at Speyer also offers a classic example of the elements of Romanesque architecture "with its surging rhythm uniting all the architectural parts into an overall system dominated by the endlessly repeated round arches of arcades, corbel tables, windows, apses and vaults." All of these elements reappear in the pilgrimage chur
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