Rouen (France) -- Description and travel; Rouen (France) -- History
The period of the first coming of Philip Augustus in the ten years
after 1210 is strongly marked by the influence of the Ile de France,
and by the French Gothic work of Suger, which at first swept out of
its path every other style with which it came in contact. But by
degrees the Norman transition re-asserts itself, and the northern
pointed work made its appearance, whose history is completed in
England, and is a different school from the Gothic on the French side
of the Channel. But every century and every style seems to have had
its say and left its mark upon the fabric of Rouen. After the
thirteenth century had built choir and transepts and a great part of
the nave, and before its close had begun the decoration of the
magnificent side portals, and the refinement of the Lady Chapel, the
first thing the fifteenth century did was to enlarge the windows of
the choir after its own manner, and widen the windows of the nave as
well. The only names we find in the fourteenth century are that of the
architect of a rose window in the nave and a tomb of Charles V.,
which have both disappeared, and that of Jean de Bayeux, the builder
of the civic belfry tower at the Hotel de Ville. But the perpetrator
of the enlarged choir windows was Jehan Salvart, who worked for Henry
V. during the English occupation, and is forgiven much, because he was
with Le Roux at the finishing of the exquisite church of St. Maclou.
The glass was put in by Jean Senlis.
I may as well complete the tale of architects now that I have begun
it, though the detail of their work is fitter given in the order of
its making, later on. But it is so rare that these master-masons have
left any traces of themselves at all, that I may perhaps be pardoned
for giving the full list that is hardly possible in any other great
cathedral in the world. Jean Roussel succeeded to his father of Bayeux
in 1430, to be followed in 1452 by Geoffroi Richier for eleven years.
Guillaume Pontifz was perhaps the greatest contributor of any of these
later men. In the thirty-four years of his office, the stalls of the
choir, representing the various crafts, were carved by several
workmen, whose names will be given later, at the cost of nearly 7000
livres, borne by the Cardinal d'Estouteville, the Portail de la
Calende was completed, a new top placed upon the Tour St. Romain, a
frigid and unpleasing staircase built in the north transept to lead up
to the canon's library, and the courtyard, with its entrance screen
placed in the Rue St. Romain before the Portail des Libraires. He also
began the Tour de Beurre, but left it to be finished by Jacques Le
Roux, who had done so much for St. Maclou, but died a poor man in
1500, and was buried beneath the organ. Within the part of this tower
that he built was hung the great bell "Georges d'Amboise," the biggest
outside Russia, which shared with "Rouvel" the affection of the
citizens, which rejoiced the heart of Francis the First, and cracked
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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