National Geographic - UK (2022-02)

Gargoyle

19th century

NAVE

CHOIR

AISLE

AISLE

TRANSEPT

ROSE

WINDOW

NOTRE DAME IN
THE 14TH CENTURY
The cathedral was
commissioned in
1163 by a landowning
clergy with power
over much of Paris.
By the 1300s, the city
had become France’s
royal, judicial, and
intellectual center.

Bells, encased in

two towers, her-

alded activities

throughout the day.

The medieval spire, dis-

mantled in the 1700s,

was replaced with a

taller one in the 1800s.

Notre Dame Cathedral has endured for more than eight centuries. Built
to reflect the church’s spiritual reach, its audacious, towering walls and

buttresses remain as much a marvel today as they were in the Middle Ages.

Fearsome and whim-

sical, grotesques, or

chimeras, are 19th-

century additions.

The 28 colossal stat-
ues of biblical kings
were beheaded in
the French Revolu-
tion and replaced in
the 19th century.

Chapels between

the 16-foot-deep

buttresses were

added after 1225.

1840s to ’60s, MAJOR RESTORATION

In 1831, The Hunchback of Notre Dame revive

interest in the site. Renovations (in green) by

architects Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc

and his early partner, Jean-Baptiste Lassus,

reflect their interpretations of medieval style

21ST-CENTURY LOSS

Fire broke out under the roof o

cathedral on April 15, 2019, and

for 15 hours. The roof and spire

lost, but firefighters saved the

ing and precious relics.

A Divine Ambition