Editing Parvise

{{Short description|Forecourt of a church building}}
[[File:Basilica San Pietro din Roma6.jpg|thumb|Part of [[St. Peter's Square]] in Rome, the parvis of [[St. Peter's Basilica]]]]
[[File:Basilica San Pietro din Roma16.jpg|thumb|Colonnade of St. Peter's Square]]
{{wikt | parvis}}
{{redirect|parvis}}
A '''parvis''' or '''parvise''' is the open space in front of and around a [[cathedral]] or [[Church (building) |church]],{{sfn|Fleming|Honour|Pevsner|1980|p=238}} especially when surrounded by either [[colonnade]]s or [[portico]]es, as at [[St. Peter's Basilica]] in [[Rome]].{{sfn|Cross|Livingstone|1997|p= 1224}} It is thus a church-specific type of forecourt, front yard or apron.

==Etymology==
The term derives via [[Old French]] from the [[Latin]] ''paradisus'' meaning "[[paradise]]".{{sfn|Brown|1993|p=2112}} This in turn came via [[Ancient Greek]] from the [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]] [[Aryan]] languages of [[History of Iran| ancient Iran]], where it meant a walled enclosure or garden precinct with heavenly flowers planted by the Clercs (Clerics).{{cn|date=June 2020}}

==Parvis of St Paul's Cathedral==
In London in the [[England in the Middle Ages|Middle Ages]] the [[Serjeant-at-law| Serjeants-at-law]] practised at the parvis of [[St Paul's Cathedral]], where clients could seek their counsel. In the 14th century [[Geoffrey Chaucer]] referred to ''"A sergeant of the laws ware and wise/ That often hadde yben at the par[[Middle English orthography|u]]{{efn|that is, v (the letter "v" in its modern shape did not appear in the repertoire of most Middle English scribes}}is..."''.{{sfn|Chaucer|loc=verse 8396}} Later, [[ecclesiastical court]]s developed at [[Doctors' Commons]] on the same site.

{{notelist}}

==Late English use==
[[File:Cirencester StJohnBaptistChurch.jpg|thumb|Three-storey [[English Gothic architecture#Perpendicular Gothic|Perpendicular Gothic]] porch of [[Church of St. John the Baptist, Cirencester]]: an elaborate example of what in later English usage has been called a parvise]]
In [[England]] the term was much later used to mean a room over the [[porch]] of a church. The architectural historians [[John Fleming (art historian) |John Fleming]], [[Hugh Honour]] and [[Nikolaus Pevsner]],{{sfn|Fleming|Honour|Pevsner|1980|p= 238}} and the theologians [[Frank Leslie Cross| Frank Cross]] and [[Elizabeth Livingstone]] all say this usage is wrong. The ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' records this use as being "historical", and current in the middle of the 19th century.{{sfn|Brown|1993|p=2112}} It may stem from an earlier misuse in F. Blomefield's book ''Norfolk'', published in 1744.{{sfn|Cross|Livingstone|1997|p= 1224}}

===Examples of English parvises===
<gallery>
File:CAParvise.JPG|The Parvise at [[Castle Ashby]], [[Northamptonshire]]
File:ParviseBletchingley.jpg|[[Bletchingley]] Church Parvise, [[Surrey]]
File:MalmesburyParvise.JPG|[[Malmesbury Abbey]], [[Wiltshire]]
File:Dodford Church 16th March 2007 (2).JPG|The Parvise at [[Dodford, Northamptonshire|Dodford]] Parish Church, [[Northamptonshire]]
File:IMAG0104.jpg|The Parvise at [[Martham, Norfolk|Martham]] Parish Church, [[Norfolk]]
</gallery>

==See also==
*[[Church of the Holy Sepulchre]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

===Sources===
*{{cite book |editor-last=Brown |editor-first=Lesley |year=1993 |orig-year=1933 |title=The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles |volume=II |edition=3rd |place=Oxford |publisher=[[Oxford University Press|Clarendon Press]] |isbn=0-19-861134-X |page=[https://archive.org/details/newshorteroxford00lesl/page/2112 2112] |url=https://archive.org/details/newshorteroxford00lesl/page/2112 }}
*{{cite book |last=Chaucer |first=Geoffrey |author-link=Geoffrey Chaucer |title=[[The Canterbury Tales]] |chapter=The Clerkes Tale |at=verse 8396 }}
*{{cite book |editor1-last=Cross |editor1-first=F. L. |editor1-link=Frank Leslie Cross |editor2-last=Livingstone |editor2-first=E. A. |year=1997 |orig-year=1957 |title=The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church |edition=3rd |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=0-19-211655-X |page=[https://archive.org/details/oxforddictionary00late/page/1224 1224] |url=https://archive.org/details/oxforddictionary00late/page/1224 }}
*{{cite book |last1=Fleming |first1=John |author-link1=John Fleming (art historian) |last2=Honour |first2=Hugh |author-link2=Hugh Honour |last3=Pevsner |first3=Nikolaus |author-link3=Nikolaus Pevsner |year=1980 |orig-year=1966 |title=The Penguin Dictionary of Architecture |place=Harmondsworth |publisher=[[Penguin Books]] |isbn=0-14-051013-3 |page=[https://archive.org/details/penguindictionar00flem_0/page/238 238] |url=https://archive.org/details/penguindictionar00flem_0/page/238 }}

== Further reading ==
{{commonscat|Parvises}}
*{{cite book |editor-last=Hoad |editor-first=TF |year=1996 |title=The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology |publisher=Oxford University Press }}
*{{cite book
 |editor1-last=Soanes |editor1-first=Catherine |editor2-last=Stevenson |editor2-first=Angus |year=2005
 |title=[[Oxford Dictionary of English]] |edition=2nd, revised |publisher=Oxford University Press 
}}

[[Category:Architectural elements]]