16.3: France

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Later apse vaulting, Basilica of St. Denis, St. Denis, France, 1135-1144. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Basilica of Saint Denis

By Alena M. Buis

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): Choir, Basilica of St. Denis, St. Denis, France, 1135-1144. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Thus, the Abbey of Saint-Denis became the prototype for further building in the royal domain of northern France. Through the rule of the Angevin dynasty, the style was introduced to England and spread throughout France, the Low Countries, Germany, Spain, northern Italy, and Sicily.

The dark Romanesque nave, with its thick walls and small window openings, was rebuilt using the latest techniques, in what is now known as Gothic. This new style, which differed from Suger’s earlier works as much as they had differed from their Romanesque precursors, reduced the wall area to an absolute minimum. Solid masonry was replaced with vast window openings filled with brilliant stained glass and interrupted only by the most slender of bar tracery—not only in the clerestory but also, perhaps for the first time, in the normally dark triforium level. The upper facades of the two much-enlarged transepts were filled with two spectacular rose windows. As with Suger’s earlier rebuilding work, the identity of the architect or master mason is unknown.

The abbey is often referred to as the “royal necropolis of France” as it is the site where the kings of France and their families were buried for centuries. All but three of the monarchs of France from the 10th century until 1789 have their remains here. The effigies of many of the kings and queens are on their tombs, but during the French Revolution, those tombs were opened and the bodies were moved to mass graves.

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Chartres Cathedral

By Muffet Jones

Figure \(\PageIndex{5}\): Cathedral of Notre Dame de Chartres, c. 1145 and 1194-c.1220 (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

In France, Chartres Cathedral about 50 miles southwest of Paris exhibits the Gothic style as it developed. Begun as a Romanesque church in 1145, the rebuilding of Chartres in the High Gothic style began in earnest in 1194 after a fire in that year. It continued through the 12^th and 13^th centuries and exhibits the hallmarks of High Gothic style: high nave with pointed arches, elaborate flying buttresses, thin walls with large, ornate stained glass windows.

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The Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Paris

by Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker

Figure \(\PageIndex{16}\): April 2019 fire at Notre Dame de Paris, France. (Photo: Milliped, CC BY-SA 4.0)

The fire

The blaze that engulfed the Cathedral of Notre Dame on the small Island known as the Île de la Cité in Paris in April 2019 was a terrible tragedy (see Figure \(\PageIndex{16}\)). Though it may not give us much comfort to learn that the total or partial destruction of churches by fire was a fairly common occurrence in medieval Europe, it does provide some perspective. For example, a fire destroyed most of Chartres Cathedral in 1020 (and again in 1194), in the city of Reims, the cathedral was badly damaged in a fire in 1210, and at Beauvais, the cathedral was rebuilt after a fire in the 1180s. The list goes on and on.

During the medieval periods of the Romanesque and the Gothic (c. 1000-1400), church fires were less frequent than they had been previously due to the development of stone vaulting (which began to replace the timber ceilings commonly found in European churches). But even a stone vault, as we saw at Notre Dame in Paris, is itself protected by a timber roof (sometimes rising more than 50 feet above the stone vaulting and pitched to prevent the accumulation of rain and snow), and this is what caught fire.

Art historian Caroline Brazelius, who has worked on the building for years said, “between the vaults and the roof, there is a forest of timber”—old, dry, porous, and highly flammable timber. Still, photographs of the interior show at least some of the stone vaulting survived the recent fire. The builders of Notre Dame used Parisian limestone, but, as Brazelius notes, “when it’s exposed to fire, stone is damaged. It doesn’t actually burn….It becomes friable. It chips, and it’s no longer structurally sound.”

Built, modified, rebuilt, and restored

Churches are often an amalgamation of architectural styles, the result of building campaigns and modifications undertaken at different times, some due to fire, some due to the desire for what a new style represents, and some due to (often inaccurate) restoration efforts. And on a single site, churches were often built and rebuilt — and this is the case with Notre Dame in Paris. Before the Gothic-style church was built, a Carolingian church occupied the site (it was destroyed during the 9th century Viking invasions), and before that, a 6th century Merovingian Church stood on the site.

If we go back further, to the pre-Christian era, Julius Caesar’s armies famously conquered much of what we call France today (Roman Paris dates back to 52 BCE). Archaeological evidence suggests that a pagan temple and then a Christian basilica were built on this site. The ancient Romans also built a palace for the emperor on the Île de la Cité, and after the Roman empire collapsed, Clovis I, King of the Franks (who converted to Christianity) established his palace there as well. The Île de la Cité would remain the location of a royal residence until the 14th century. As one historian has noted, “Notre Dame … was not only a religious but also a royal monument that displayed the might of the church and the monarchy, each enhancing the power of the other.”^[1]

Figure \(\PageIndex{19}\): Crossing, Notre Dame de Paris, c. 1163-1250. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

The Gothic Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris took nearly 100 years to complete (c. 1163-1250) and modifications, restorations, and renovations continued for centuries after. The early Gothic style employed at the beginning of the campaign became outdated and the later Gothic style, the Rayonnant, became fashionable and can be seen in the transepts. The crossing spire that the world watched fall while engulfed in flames was a reproduction created during a 19th-century restoration campaign.

In the following centuries, the church (and its sculptural decoration) survived multiple episodes of intentional destruction: during the Protestant Reformation, due to Protestant objection to religious imagery, and during the revolutions of 1789 and 1830, because of the church’s close association with the monarchy. It remained in a neglected state until Victor Hugo’s novel, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) revived popular interest the building (see Figure \(\PageIndex{20}\)).

Figure \(\PageIndex{20}\): View of Notre Dame de Paris, c. 1163-1250. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

As of this writing, just a few days after the April 15th blaze, evaluation of the damage caused by the fire is only just beginning, but a reported one billion dollars has been already been raised to support the reconstruction of Notre Dame de Paris.

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Sainte-Chapelle (Paris): A Conversation

By Alena M. Buis 

The style of Louis’ court radiated throughout Europe through the purchase of art objects from Parisian masters for export and by the marriage of the King’s daughters and female relatives to foreign husbands. Louis’ personal chapel, La Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, was copied more than once by his descendants elsewhere.

Figure \(\PageIndex{21}\): Apse interior, Sainte-Chapelle, Île de la Cité, Paris, France, 1248. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

La Sainte-Chapelle (The Holy Chapel) is one of the only surviving buildings of the Capetian royal palace on the Île de la Cité in the heart of Paris, France. It was commissioned by King Louis IX of France to house his collection of relics of the passion, including the Crown of Thorns—one of the most important relics in medieval Christendom. Begun sometime after 1239 and consecrated on April 26, 1248, the Sainte-Chapelle is considered among the highest achievements of the Rayonnant period of Gothic architecture. Although damaged during the French revolution and heavily restored in the 19^th century, it retains one of the most extensive in-situ collections (collections that are still in their original positions) of 13th-century stained glass anywhere in the world. The glass depicts stories from the Old Testament and focuses heavily on the depictions of biblical kings, both good and bad. Scholars believe the inclusion of “bad” kings, along with the good, were meant as a lesson for the royal viewer to learn from both good and bad examples of rulership.

La Sainte-Chapelle is a prime example of the phase of Gothic architectural style called “Rayonnant Gothic,” also known as Court Style, and is marked by its sense of weightlessness and strong vertical emphasis. Rayonnant structures tend to be smaller than the High Gothic Cathedrals that came before them. La Sainte-Chapelle stands squarely upon a lower chapel, which served as a parish church for all the inhabitants of the palace, which was the seat of government. However, the chapel proper was a private royal chapel and scholars have noted how the structure almost looks like metalwork as if the chapel itself is a reliquary.

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Saint Louis Bible (Moralized Bible or Bible moralisée)

by Louisa Woodville

Figure \(\PageIndex{24}\): Top: Blanche of Castile and King Louis IX of France, and below: Author Dictating to a Scribe, Bible of Saint Louis (Moralized Bible), France, probably Paris, c. 1227-34. Ink, tempera, and gold leaf on vellum, 14 3/4 x 10 1/4 inches / 37.5 x 26.2 cm. (The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.240, fol. 8) (Photo via Smarthistory)

Blanche of Castile

In 1226 a French king died, leaving his queen to rule his kingdom until their son came of age. The 38-year-old widow, Blanche of Castile, had her work cut out for her. Rebelling barons were eager to win back lands that her husband’s father had seized from them. They rallied troops against her, defamed her character, and even accused her of adultery and murder.

Caught in a perilous web of treachery, insurrections, and open warfare, Blanche persuaded, cajoled, negotiated, and fought would-be enemies after her husband, King Louis VIII, died of dysentery after only a three-year reign. When their son Louis IX took the helm in 1234, he inherited a kingdom that was, for a time anyway, at peace.

A manuscript illumination

A dazzling illumination in New York’s Morgan Library could well depict Blanche of Castile and her son Louis, a beardless youth crowned king (see Figure \(\PageIndex{25}\)). A cleric and a scribe are depicted underneath them (see Figure \(\PageIndex{24}\)). Each figure is set against a ground of burnished gold, seated beneath a trefoil arch. Stylized and colorful buildings dance above their heads, suggesting a sophisticated, urban setting—perhaps Paris, the capital city of the Capetian kingdom (the Capetians were one of the oldest royal families in France) and home to a renowned school of theology.

A moralized Bible

This last page the New York Morgan Library’s manuscript MS M 240 is the last quire (folded page) of a three-volume moralized bible, the majority of which is housed at the Cathedral Treasury in Toledo, Spain. Moralized bibles, made expressly for the French royal house, include lavishly illustrated abbreviated passages from the Old and New Testaments. Explanatory texts that allude to historical events and tales accompany these literary and visual readings, which—woven together—convey a moral.

Assuming historians are correct in identifying the two rulers, we are looking at the four people intensely involved in the production of this manuscript. As patron and ruler, Queen Blanche of Castile would have financed its production. As ruler-to-be, Louis IX’s job was to take its lessons to heart along with those from the other biblical and ancient texts that his tutors read with him.

King and queen

In the upper register, an enthroned king and queen wear the traditional medieval open crown topped with fleur-de-lys—a stylized iris or lily symbolizing a French monarch’s religious, political, and dynastic right to rule. The blue-eyed queen, is veiled in a white widow’s wimple. An ermine-lined blue mantle drapes over her shoulders. Her pink T-shaped tunic spills over a thin blue edge of paint which visually supports these enthroned figures. A slender green column divides the queen’s space from that of her son, King Louis IX, to whom she deliberately gestures across the page, raising her left hand in his direction. Her pose and animated facial expression suggest that she is dedicating this manuscript, with its lessons and morals, to the young king

Louis IX, wearing an open crown atop his head, returns his mother’s glance. In his right hand he holds a scepter, indicating his kingly status. It is topped by the characteristic fleur-de-lys on which, curiously, a small bird sits. A four-pedaled brooch, dominated by a large square of sapphire blue in the center, secures a pink mantle lined with green that rests on his boyish shoulders.

In his left hand, between his forefinger and thumb, Louis holds a small golden ball or disc. During the mass that followed coronations, French kings and queens would traditionally give the presiding bishop of Reims 13 gold coins (all French kings were crowned in this northern French cathedral town.) This could reference Louis’ 1226 coronation, just three weeks after his father’s death, suggesting a probable date for this bible’s commission. A manuscript this lavish, however, would have taken eight to ten years to complete—perfect timing, because in 1235, the 21-year-old Louis was ready to assume the rule of his Capetian kingdom from his mother.

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Articles in this section:

• 13.1: French Gothic Architecture is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Alena M. Buis
• Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker, "Cathedral of Notre Dame de Chartres," in Smarthistory, December 18, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker, "The Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Paris," in Smarthistory, April 24, 2019 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• 13.1: French Gothic Architecture is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Alena M. Buis 
• Louisa Woodville, "Saint Louis Bible (Moralized Bible or Bible moralisée)," in Smarthistory, August 8, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)