Girona Cathedral, also known as the Cathedral of Saint Mary of Girona (in Catalan: Catedral de Santa Maria de Girona or simply Catedral de Girona), is a Roman Catholic church located in Girona, Catalonia, Spain. It is the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Girona. The cathedral's interior includes the widest Gothic nave in the world, with a width of 23 metres (75 ft), and the second-widest of any church after that of St. Peter's Basilica (for comparison, the width of the nave of Reims Cathedral is 14.65 m, Saint-Étienne de Sens is 15.25 m, and 12 m in Notre Dame de Paris). Its construction was begun in the 11th century in the Romanesque architectural style, and continued in the 13th century in the Gothic style. Of the original Romanesque edifice only the 12th-century cloister and a bell tower remain. The second bell tower was completed in the 18th century.
A primitive Christian church existed here before the Islamic conquest of Iberia, after which it was converted into a mosque, in 717. The Franks reconquered the city in 785 under Charlemagne and the church was reconsecrated in 908.
Romanesque cathedralIn 1015, the church was in poor condition. Bishop Peter Roger, son of Count Roger I of Carcassonne, restored it with the money obtained by selling the church of the St. Daniel to his brother-in-law, Count Ramon Borrell of Barcelona. The church and its cloister were built until 1064, in Romanesque style. The bell tower was completed in 1117.
Gothic cathedralThe complex was redesigned by Pere Sacoma in 1312. After some years of indecisiveness, Guillem Bofill and Antoni Canet started the project in 1416. The new design consisted of a large Gothic nave, the widest Gothic nave in the world—22.98 m—and the second-widest nave of all styles after St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. The elevation in the vault is 35 metres (115 ft).
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