The Gothic cathedral—from St.-Denis and Notre-Dame of Paris to Chartres, Reims, and Amiens—stands out for a reason. Their flying buttresses, lofty towers, and subaqueous stained-glass windows showcase a harmonious blend of divine inspiration and human craftsmanship that has captivated souls for centuries. They rose out of the Middle Ages in a quest to achieve greater heights and maximum light, revolutionizing the way cathedrals and other large religious buildings were subsequently designed and built.
The story of their birth, which relied on the convergence of several key architectural elements, begins with an industrious and powerful abbot of Saint-Denis named Suger. Who was this Gothic mastermind, and how did he make it happen?
(Notre Dame rises again.)
All in a name
No one called the new architectural style Gothic at the time. In the 16th century, critics mocked the medieval approach, calling it “Gothic” after the Goths of the Germanic lands, the barbarians who had overthrown the Roman Empire in the 4th to 5th century A.D. The "father of art history," Giorgio Vasari, joined in the melée, lambasting the style as “monstrous, barbarous and disorderly.” Although Gothic had more to do with the disdain of the Renaissance men for their northern rivals than with the Goths, the description stuck and today is virtually inseparable from what most people consider to be the world’s most beautiful and iconic cathedrals.
The abbey
It all started when King Dagobert founded the Abbey of St.-Denis in the seventh century. He built the structure in the northern suburbs of modern-day Paris over the tomb of St. Denis, the patron saint of France who had supposedly brought Christianity to Gaul. The church went on to become the burial place of the kings of France (including Dagobert), as well as the depository for the crowns, scepters, jewels, and other regalia used in French coronations.
Fast-forward to the 12th century, when Abbot Suger, a close adviser to the French kings Louis VI and Louis VII, was named the abbot of St.-Denis around 1122. Right away, he had two issues. First, the abbey was not large enough to hold the crowds of pilgrims who attended on feast days, “for the narrowness of the place forced the women to run toward the altar upon the heads of men as upon a pavement with much anguish and noisy confusion,” he wrote. At that time, churches were built in the Romanesque style, with barrel vaulted roofs, thick walls, and small windows that made the interiors dark and cramped and structurally impossible to change.
Suger also was interested in the doctrine of John the Scot who translated and commented on the work of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, which associated light with the power of God. Suger saw how light could be used to raise human consciousness from the earthly realm to a heavenly one. And he understood the best way to accomplish this feat was with windows, especially stained-glass windows, that flooded the interior with light. But no one knew how to build heavy stained-glass windows into the Romanesque structure without the walls crumbling down around them.
So Suger needed a way to create more interior space, as well as a way to incorporate support into the structure. He turned to a trio of architectural innovations, some of which had been used elsewhere and some of which are attributed to him—and figured out how to bring them all together in one “unified whole,” as he described it. Incorporating the original St.-Denis Abbey building, he used these elements to construct a new basilica that went on to transform Western architecture. They include:
- Ribbed vaulting:Suger was able to install a much higher nave in St.-Denis by using ribbed vaults for the ceiling. This new method of structural support, using a complex web of small diagonal arches, distributed the weight of the roof and upper walls more efficiently, allowing for taller and more open interior space.
- Pointed arches:Ribbed vaulting, in turn, allowed for the creation of pointed arches. The pointed arch in fact was nothing new; it diffused from the Arab world, where it had been used for centuries. But for St.-Denis and church building in general, it was a game-changer. While Romanesque architecture used round arches (which the Romans perfected to build their aqueducts, bridges, and colosseums), pointed arches were used to distribute the vault’s weight in a vertical rather than horizontal direction, allowing the use of slender columns and high, large open archways.
- Flying buttresses:Evolving from simpler hidden supports used as far back as Greek and Roman times, flying buttresses supported the structure’s exterior with an arched or sloping design, like outstretched limbs. In effect, they transferred the weight of the roof away from the walls and onto these exterior elements. This invention, combined with pointed arches, allowed the walls to continue to climb and enormous stained-glass windows to be inserted into them.
(What is ‘Gothic’? It’s more complicated than you think.)
New heights
Integrating these architectural elements, St.-Denis emerged in 1144 as a graceful, light structure with thin, tall walls and enormous stained-glass windows that filled the airy space with colored light. No building before had achieved such airy, light-filled openness.
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But that wasn’t all. Suger added radiating chapels around the ambulatory of the choir, creating a visually stunning and functional arrangement that became a hallmark of Gothic cathedrals. And he hired skilled artisans and craftsmen to create statues—including gargoyles and chimeras—and other forms of decoration for both the interior and facade of the structure that not only added visual delight, but also offered the masses of illiterate believers a way to be served. The statues and stained-glass windows contained biblical stories, symbols, and signs to anyone passing by or entering these churches, in effect serving as the poor man’s bible.
(See how stonemasons keep England’s oldest cathedrals standing tall.)
Enduring impact
While St.-Denis was promoted as the first Gothic cathedral in medieval France, it served as a model for subsequent Gothic cathedrals and churches in France and beyond, including Notre-Dame in nearby Paris, begun in 1163 and largely completed in 1260. The style rapidly spread to England (including the famous Canterbury Cathedral and Westminster Abbey), Germany, Spain, Italy, and beyond.
(An 800-year history of Paris's Notre Dame Cathedral.)
It often took decades if not centuries to construct these Gothic beauties, with multiple generations of architects, builders, and craftsmen contributing to their completion. These majestic structures invariably became the centerpieces of cities and towns, contributing to the cultural and religious life of medieval Europe, as well as symbols of power and influence of the Catholic Church. As they towered above, reaching toward the skies, they became tangible expressions of the medieval worldview, reflecting a belief in the importance of divine worship and the interconnectedness of religion, politics, and society.
Portions of this work have previously appeared in Inside the Medieval World. Copyright © 2014 National Geographic Society.
To learn more, check out Inside the Medieval World. Available wherever books and magazines are sold.
