Beauvais Cathedral
Beauvais Cathedral Cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Beauvais | ||
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Year consecrated 1272[1] | | |
Status | Active | |
Location | ||
Location | Beauvais, France | |
Geographic coordinates | 49°25′57″N 2°04′53″E / 49.4326°N 2.0814°E | |
Architecture | ||
Architect(s) | Enguerrand Le Riche Martin Chambiges[1] | |
Type | Church | |
Style | High Gothic | |
Groundbreaking | 1225[1] | |
Completed | Never completed. Works halted in 1600.[1] | |
Specifications | ||
Length | 72.5 m (238 ft) | |
Width | 67.2 m (220 ft) | |
Width (nave) | 16 m (52 ft) | |
Height (max) | 47.5 m (156 ft) (height nave)[3] | |
Official name: Cathédrale Notre-Dame | ||
Designated | 1840 | |
Reference no. | PA00114502[1] | |
Denomination | Église | |
Website | ||
www |
The Cathedral of Saint Peter of Beauvais (
The cathedral is in the Gothic style, and consists of a 13th-century choir, with an apse and seven polygonal apsidal chapels reached by an ambulatory, joined to a 16th-century transept.
It has the highest Gothic choir in the world: 48.5 metres (159 ft) under vault.[4] From 1569 to 1573 the cathedral of Beauvais was, with its tower of 153 m (502 ft), the highest human construction of the world. Its designers had the ambition to make it the largest gothic cathedral in France ahead of Amiens. Victim of two collapses, one in the 13th century, the other in the 16th century, it remains unfinished today; only the choir and the transept have been built.
The planned nave of the cathedral was never constructed. The remnant of the previous 10th-century
History
Work was begun in 1225 under count-bishop
The work was interrupted in 1284 by the collapse of some of the vaulting of the recently completed choir. This collapse has been seen as a disaster that produced a failure of nerve among the French masons working in Gothic style.[8] The collapse also marked the beginning of an age of smaller structures generally, which was associated with demographic decline, the Hundred Years' War, and with the thirteenth century.[9]
However, large-scale Gothic design continued, and the choir was rebuilt at the same height, albeit with more columns in the
The choir has always been wholeheartedly admired, with Eugène Viollet-le-Duc calling the Beauvais choir "the Parthenon of French Gothic." It inspired the main administration building of Fermilab near Chicago, Illinois, which has been the world's leading high-energy physics laboratory since the 1960s. The building is now called Wilson Hall after Robert R. Wilson, its founding director and a sculptor who insisted on an uplifting aesthetic.
Its
During the
Structural condition
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Beauvais Cathedral from the east
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Plan image of Beauvais Cathedral, derived fromlaser scan data collected in 2007 by nonprofit CyArkto assist in stabilization of the building
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Lateral supports offlying buttresses
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Floorplan; the lighter section in the lower half shows the nave (never constructed)
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Current floorplan
In the race to build the tallest cathedral in the 13th century, the builders of Saint-Pierre de Beauvais pushed technology to its limits. Even though the structure was to be taller, the buttresses were made thinner in order to pass maximum light into the cathedral. In 1284, only twelve years after completion, part of the choir vault collapsed, along with a few flying buttresses. It is now believed that the collapse was caused by
The accompanying photograph shows lateral iron supports between the flying buttresses; it is not known when these external tie rods were installed. The technology would have been available at the time of the initial construction, but the extra support might not have been considered necessary until after the collapse in 1284, or even later. In the 1960s, the tie rods were removed; the thinking was that they were ungraceful and unnecessary. However, the oscillations created by the wind became amplified, and the choir partially disassociated itself from the transept. Subsequently, the tie rods were reinstalled, but this time with rods made of steel. Since steel is less ductile than iron, the structure became more rigid, possibly causing additional fissures.[12]
As the floor plan shows, the original design included a nave that was never built. Thus, the absence of shouldering support that would have otherwise been provided by the nave contributes to the structural weakness of the cathedral.
With the passage of time, other problems surfaced, some requiring more drastic remedies. The north transept now has four large wood-and-steel lateral trusses at different heights, installed during the 1990s to keep the transept from collapsing (see photograph below). In addition, the main floor of the transept is interrupted by a much larger brace that rises out of the floor at a 45-degree angle.[13] This brace was installed as an emergency measure to give additional support to the pillars that, until now, have held up the tallest vault in the world.
These temporary measures will remain in place until more permanent solutions can be determined. Various studies are under way to determine with more assurance what can be done to preserve the structure. Columbia University is performing a study on a three-dimensional model constructed using laser scans of the building in an attempt to determine the weaknesses in the building and remedies.[14]
Starting in September 2022 the French government will begin a restoration of the cathedral starting with the roof and removal of the interior supports.[15] Part of the roof was analyzed and restored in a project starting in 2010.[16] The analysis done on the roof included a "multidisciplinary study" of the lead tiles which made up the roof.[17]
Interior
Several of the chapels contain medieval stained glass windows made from the 13th through to the 15th centuries. In a chapel close to the northern entrance, there is a medieval clock (14th – 15th century), possibly the oldest fully preserved and functioning mechanical clock in Europe. In its vicinity, the highly complicated Beauvais astronomical clock with moving figures was installed in 1866.
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The choir
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Interior supports of the south transept
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Stained glass windows
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Interior stained glass and choir
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Beauvais astronomical clock (1866)
See also
References
- Citations
- ^ a b c d e Mérimée database 1993
- ^ "Rinunce e Nomine, 18.03.2010" (Press release) (in Italian). Holy See Press Office. 18 March 2010. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
- ^ ISBN 0-7126-1279-3.
- S2CID 1745191.
- ^ Murray 1980:547.
- ^ William of Grez was the first bishop to be buried in the axial Lady Chapel, 1267.
- ^ Murray 1980:533 note 5.
- ^ Hong, Seong-Woo (2004). "The Analysis on the Collapse of the Tallest Gothic Cathedral" (PDF). Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitats. Retrieved 12 April 2022.
- ^ Murray 1980:533.
- ISBN 0-7506-2267-9.
- ^ Découvrir la Cathedrale Saint-Pierre de Beauvais, Philippe Bonnet-Laborderie, 2000
- ^ Stephen Murray, Beauvais Cathedral, Architecture of Transcendence, Princeton University Press, 1989
- ^ Structurae Image of Brace
- ^ The Beauvais Cathedral Project
- ^ "Restauration de la cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Beauvais".
- ^ "Restauration de la cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Beauvais".
- ^ "Cathédrale de Beauvais - la restauration des couvertures en plomb, un chantier sous haute surveillance scientifique".
- Bibliography
- "Monument historique — PA00114502". Ministère de la Culture. 1993. Retrieved 17 July 2011.
- Desjardins, Gustave (1865). Histoire de la cathédrale de Beauvais (in French). Beauvais: V. Pineau.
- Murray, Stephen: "The Choir of the Church of St.-Pierre, Cathedral of Beauvais: A Study of Gothic Architectural Planning and Constructional Chronology in Its Historical Context", The Art Bulletin 62.4 (December 1980), pp. 533–551
- Plouvier, Martine, ed. (2000). La cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Beauvais: architecture, mobilier et trésor (in French). Amiens: Association pour la généralisation de l'Inventaire régional en Picardie. ISBN 2-906340-42-1.
External links
- Cathedral of Beauvais Digital Media Archive (creative commons-licensed photos, laser scans, panoramas), data from a World Monuments Fund/CyArkresearch partnership
- Becher, Peter Karl; Howland, Matthew Barnett (September 2010). "Completing Beauvais Cathedral" (PDF). Architectural Association School of Architecture.
- Photographs and drawings of the cathedral
- High-resolution 360° Panoramas and Images of Beauvais Cathedral | Art Atlas