The Dark Ages

Many twelfth-century churches in Northern Spain
still have windows 'glazed' with sheets of alabaster
which make the interiors seem very dark to us.
But when those churches were built, common people's houses
had neither windows nor chimneys,
and the brightness of the churches attracted them.
It was too dark then.
It is too bright now.

more on the mediæval period here >>>

[Alabaster dissolves in rain,
which is why these windows survive only
in the drier parts of Northern Spain.]