Notre-Dame de Paris by Daniel Castillo

Heeello, my friends. Today, I'm going to tell a brief story about a beautiful building with one of the most espectacular architectural beauty that I have ever seen in my life (I mean it). Its name is Notre Dame, and it was built in Paris a long time ago, but the details are listed below, so enjoy.

Once upon a time (On 12 October 1160), Maurice de Sully was elected bishop of Paris.

Maurice de Sully was bishop of Paris from 1160 to 1196. He provided a pastoral, theological and spiritual response to his diocese’s deep transformations by rebuilding a cathedral church dedicated to the Virgin Mary (in this case, Notre Dame, which means “our lady” in French) and making it a bishop’s church, a canon church and a baptistery.

Tradition has it that Notre-Dame’s first stone was laid in 1163 in the presence of Pope Alexander III.

This new building was constructed under the new art movement known as the gothic or ogyval style.

Built in an age of illiteracy, the cathedral retells the stories of the Bible in its portals, paintings, and stained glass.

“The first anonymous builder began with a double side aisle plan without a salient transeptm, a four story construction with tribunes, large, 32.5 meter sexpartite arches, predominantly horizontal lines, original arch work in the curved part of the deambulatory, alternating “strong” and “weak” pillars between the first and second aisles.”

The whole cathedral was constructed by many different architects, each one in different periods of time, it was an average of four architects for each century.

Notre Dame de Paris was finished in 1345. Now, it functions as a normal church where you can mass there and it has a museum with a treasury in its sacristy.

Notre Dame nowadays.

The thing that I liked the most was the South Rose window, one of the most important masterpieces of the Christian art. It is made of stained glass obviously and it represents Christ triumphant, reining over Heaven, surrounds byall his witnesses on earth. It was a gift from the king Saint Louis. It was designed by Jean de Chelles and Pierre de Montreuil.

*Information: The South Rose Window reached 12.90 meters in diameter and, if you include its bay, a total height of nearly 19 meters. It has eighty-four panes divided into four circles. The first one has twelve medallions and the second has twenty-four. A third circle is made up of quadrilobes, and the fourth circle has twenty-four trilobes medallions.

The designer’s original plans have gone undiscovered to this day. The twelve Apostles, who were originally part of the first circle, are now distributed between the two circles, amidst other figures. In the four circles, you can see Saints and Martyrs traditionally honored in France, as well as the wise virgins.

The South Rose Window

 In my opinion, I loved this cathedral. We may all know it because of certain movies or just because of general culture, but this work made me be aware of the beauty and all the effort used to create on of the most important buildings of the world. That buildings also have their own stories to tell and that they are like living entities that will long for ever in our hearts.

Dictionary:

Ø  Sexpartite:

 (of a vault) divided into six compartments by two ogives and three transverse arches, one of which crosses the ogives at the point at which they cross each other.

Ø  Aisle:

a. a longitudinal division of an interior area, as in a church, separated from the main area by an arcade or the like.

b. any of the longitudinal divisions of a church or the like.

Ø  Tribune:

A raised platform.

Bibliography:

Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris. "Building History. Diocèse de Paris web. September 17, 2010.

Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris. "South Rose Window". Diocèse de Paris web. September 17, 2010

Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris. "panoramic views". Diocèse de Paris web. September 17, 2010

Discover France.net. Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris. September 17, 2010.

Great buildings web. Notre Dame Cathedral by Kevin Mathews. September 17, 2010.