The Openwork
Flying Buttresses
of Amiens
Gothic"
"Postmodern andtheLimits
ofStructural
Rationalism
ROBERTBORK,FloridaAtlanticUniversity
ROBERTMARK,PrincetonUniversity
STEPHENMURRAY,ColumbiaUniversity
FLYINGBurTREssEs THROUGHTHE LENS OF MODERNISM
The flying buttress has long been considered a quintessential
element within the structural framework of Gothic architec-
ture, and much effort has been devoted to explaining its
origins and early evolution in French churches of the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries.1 Successive refinements of the flying
buttress system permitted dramatic increases in height and
overall structural lightness in this period. It is not entirely
surprising, therefore, that histories of the flying buttress tend
to be based on ideas of progress and structural rationalism.2
Because the novel form of the flying buttress was entirely
devoid of visual reference to historic prototypes, moreover,
earlier generations have been tempted to explain the flyer
phenomenon within a larger historical analogy between Gothic
art and modernism.3 From this perspective, the history of the
flying buttress could be seen purely in terms of the depen-
dence of form upon structural function.
The inadequacy of this deterministic interpretive matrix
stands revealed in the building history of Amiens cathedral,
where the highly refined and successful structural system of
the nave (Figure 1) appears to have been willfully abandoned
in the later transept and choir in favor of a problematical
scheme based upon the openwork flying buttress, an improb-
able structural element in which the buttress itself is dissolved
into a tracery screen (Figure 2).4 The adoption of the open-
work flying buttress at Amiens deserves comment, especially
because the nave of the cathedral has been cited, with good
reason, as a paragon of perfected Gothic structural design.5
Recent studies have shown that even the pinnacles of the
Amiens nave play a structural role, confirming one of the
more outlandish-sounding claims of nineteenth-century struc-
tural rationalism.6 The overall structural system of the Amiens
nave, with two tiers of flying buttresses, follows the "classic"
example of Soissons, Longpont, and Reims. As Viollet-le-Duc
and other early scholars realized, these two tiers perform
different functions: the lower balances the thrust of the nave
478 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997
Cathedral
vaults; the upper helps to stabilize the nave wall while its
grooved upper surface serves as an aqueduct to evacuate
rainwater.7 In addition, it has been observed that the upper
tier of flyers plays an important role in resisting the substantial
wind forces on the nave roof.8 That this structural system
continues to function after nearly eight centuries is testimony
to the skill and experience of its designers, Robert de Luzarches
and Thomas de Cormont.9
Thus it seems clear that the decision to adopt openwork
flyers in the transept and choir of Amiens cannot have been
based on dissatisfaction with the structural performance of the
classic abutment scheme of the nave. In the progressive narra-
tive of Gothic as medieval modernism, therefore, this develop-
ment could only be left undiscussed or written off as "deca-
dent."10 In privileging the earlier campaigns at Amiens over
the later ones, this view of Gothic through the lens of modern-
ism provides a distorted and oversimplified vision of the
medieval design process. Today, some thirty years after Robert
Venturi opened the door to postmodernism by calling on
builders and theorists to embrace "complexity and contradic-
tion in architecture," it should be possible to consider the
openwork flyer and its meaning in a more openminded man-
ner, gaining important insights into the nature of Gothic
design along the way."
The "modernist" interpretation, in which the introduction
of the openwork flying buttress represents a "decadent" depar-
ture from the progressive problem-solving tradition that had
produced the Amiens nave, is flawed both by its reductionist
assumptions and by its overly linear view of architectural
history. This interpretation seems implicitly to assume that the
Amiens nave represents the solution to a purely structural
problem. Gothic architecture clearly evolved in response to
aesthetic and symbolic as well as structural and constructional
requirements. After all, the very desire to construct colossal,
brightly lit churches cannot be justified on strict functionalist
grounds. A second problem with the decadence argument is
that it focuses on the evolution of the "classic" buttressing
system of Soissons, Longpont, and Amiens in isolation without
taking into account other contemporary developments in
flying buttress design. At least three strains of flying buttress
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i:Amienscathedral,
FIGURE

BORK/MARK/MURRAY:AMIENS CATHEDRAL 479

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FIGURE2: Amiens cathedral,choir flyers

configuration had begun to emerge by the end of the twelfth-
century, and the "classic" system was neither the most structur-
ally efficient nor the only one that had been deployed success-
fully at large scale.
In the first type, represented by Bourges cathedral, the
flying buttresses remain fairly low, sloping along the pyramidal
exterior elevations of the five-aisled church (Figure 3). Early
steps in this direction may have been taken at Notre-Dame de
Paris, where the unprecedented height and thinness of the
clerestory walls probably forced the deployment of flying
buttresses as technical fixes.12 At Bourges, a single, steeply
sloping chord defines the upper margin of the flying buttress
system. Because this unusual triangular geometry produces rela-
tivelyshort pier uprights, the structural efficiency of the Bourges
scheme was unsurpassed in later Gothic construction.'3
The "classic" structural format of the Amiens nave first
appeared in the choir of Soissons cathedral.'14 This system,
with its tall buttress uprights and double flying buttresses set at

480 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997

a relatively low angle of incline, emerged at Soissons as a direct
response to the great height of the clerestory. The two flying
buttresses are identical except for the inclusion of a drain in
the upper. As a result, the same formwork could be used to
construct both the upper and lower tiers. Although this system
would continue in use throughout the Middle Ages, all the
essential ingredients were already in place at Soissons.
lot.
4WA
THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE OPENWORK
FLYING BUTTRESS: A PROPOSAL ..........
The origins of the openwork flying buttress system, the third ?ij
major strain, may be traced to Chartres. At Chartres, as at
.. .

Soissons, the great height of the clerestory suggested the pl?

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FIGURE4: Chartrescathedral,nave flyers

tilI u deployment of tall buttress uprights supporting a two-tiered

flyer system. At Chartres, however, the two tiers are linked by
radial spokes, and the upper and lower tiers differ in their
form (Figure 4). The lower tier consists of a radially jointed
arc, while the upper more closely resembles a "normal" flying
buttress, with a radially jointed lower course and a straight
upper rim.15As a result, the Chartres flyers read as one large
L

gi Ii'~ buttress that has been pulled apart, leaving radial connections,
-------- --- --- -- rather than as two separate structures.
The design of the Chartres flyers may have been motivated
by several factors. Perhaps the builders felt that tying the upper
and the lower parts of the unit together with substantial spokes
would strengthen and stiffen the structure. Given the excep-
tional width of the nave and the unprecedented height of the
clerestory, they clearly wanted to err on the side of prudence.
By comparison with Bourges, certainly, Chartres seems massive
and even overbuilt.16 Constructional rather than structural
factors may also have been considered at Chartres. The lower
arc may well have served as a permanent formwork upon
which the spokes and upper chord could be laid, providing at
FIGURE3: Bourges cathedral,transverse section of choir least the same degree of economy as the Soissons system.17

AMIENSCATHEDRAL481
BORK/MARK/MURRAY:
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FIGURE5: Troyes cathedral,transept flyers te.
Finally, one must consider the visual and semiotic dimensions.
While the flying buttress would become a ubiquitous and
explicit Gothic motif and signifier in the course of the thir-
teenth century, the earliest flyers of the twelfth century were
more modest in appearance and might have shocked certain
beholders as a crude technical fix. The designers of Chartres
took care to integrate the appearance of the flyers with other
key elements of the building-the radial spokes of the flyers
mimic the forms of the great west rose, for example.8 In this
way the units serve as bearers of meaning in addition to
serving a structural function.'9 The Chartres flyers thus em-
body the integration of art and structure for which Gothic
architecture isjustifiably famous.
Following the construction of the flyers of Chartres with
their radial spokes (probably in the 1210s or 1220s), a closely
related form was developed: the tracery flyer with vertical
panels. The chronology of the churches where such experi-
ments took place cannot be fixed with sufficient certainty to
allow us to identify the "first" of these flyers. Not only did the
builders of Troyes, Auxerre, and Amiens cathedrals and the
collegiate church of St.-Quentin all refer to the common
prototype of Chartres; they must have interacted with one
another and traded ideas from one site to the next. In the case
of Troyes, Auxerre, and St.-Quentin, the decision to employ
this new, lightweight type of flyer responded to a particularly
pressing problem-the need to support a clerestory that was
taller than originally anticipated where the substructure sim-
ply did not provide the necessary base for heavier units. In
each case, too, we are dealing with the attenuated Champenois/
Picard approach to Gothic that favored the optical effects of
slender supports. In the case of Troyes and Amiens we are
dealing with double-aisled choirs where the intermediary piers
482 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997
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dividing the side aisles did not have the mass necessary to
support double flyers of the heavy type found at Soissons and
in the Amiens nave.
The earliest essays that can be documented with any degree
of certainty took place at Troyes cathedral in the aftermath of
the collapse of the unfinished upper choir in 1228. Norbert
Bongartz has provided meticulous documentation of the work
at Troyes, suggesting a date for the upper choir in the 1230s.20
He has demonstrated the way in which a cathedral begun
according to the expectations that were normal in the years
around 1200 was modified to conform to the norms that we
have dubbed High Gothic and Rayonnant. These modifica-
tions brought thicker main piers and arcade wall and greater
height, but could not change the slender buttresses of the aisle
wall that belong to an earlier phase.
The lightweight Troyes choir flyers were thus designed in
relation to the task of spanning a double aisle: supporting a
high vault and not imposing a massive weight on their sup-
ports. That they failed was the result partly of the fact that they
were placed too high and partly of the inadequacy of the
foundations, which allowed differential settlement. The Troyes
choir flyers were entirely replaced in the nineteenth century,
but their form is known from the graphic evidence as well as
from similar units that survive in the transept (Figure 5).
The construction of the upper choir at Auxerre cathedral
took place in the 1230s, simultaneously with that at Troyes.
Harry Titus has argued that although the chevet had been
begun around 1217, the plan was modified soon afterward
(1220/1230s), providing for a kind of vertical "stretching."21
The tall clerestory of Auxerre is supported by openwork flyers
with vertical panels; however, the flyers were rebuilt in the
fourteenth and again in the nineteenth century, and it is

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difficult to establish the form of the thirteenth-century units
with any certainty. Massive buttresses of the Soissons type could
not possibly have been erected on the fragile substructures of
the earlier choir aisles, and some kind of lightweight solution
must have been found.
The situation at the collegiate church of St.-Quentin is
similar. Ellen Shortell has recently demonstrated that the
church was begun earlier than had been thought, probably at
the very end of the twelfth century.22 The tall clerestory was
certainly not anticipated at this date; the lower parts of the choir
simply do not provide a base for heavy flyers. The openwork
units with their vertical panels are largely the result of restora-
tion, but the existing flyers certainly reproduce the form of the
original units, which belong to the mid-thirteenth century.
The openwork flyer thus appears to have emerged as a
lightweight version of the Chartres flyer in which the upper
rim was rendered as a straight chord and the radial spokes
were modified into vertical mullions. This reduction and
linearization of the structural system made good sense because
it harmonized visually with the brittle-looking voided walls of
Burgundian, Champenois, and Picard Gothic. Although the
fragility of the openwork system would later become clear, its
early use cannot be written off as a decadent mannerism.
Instead, it represents a plausible and indeed rational modifica-
tion of a known and successful prototype in relation to local
circumstances. By the middle of the thirteenth century, there-
fore, the openwork flying buttress had emerged as a seemingly
viable alternative to the Soissonais two-tier system.
Over the course of the early thirteenth century, flying
buttress design grew more refined technically and visually. As
noted above, the spoked flying buttresses of Chartres repre-
sent one of the first clear attempts to aestheticize this struc-
..........
J,
21
.....
....
... FIGURE6: Amiens cathedral, junction between
solid and openwork near crossing
tural member. At Reims, the classic Soissonais system was
dressed up with crockets, elaborate pinnacles, and angel-
carrying aediculae, turning the building into a representation
of the Heavenly City and symbolically enshrining the corona-
tion site of the French kings. At the large but relatively squat
cathedral of Strasbourg, a single, steeply inclined flyer took the
place of the classic Soissonais doublet, offering clear advan-
tages in simplicity of construction.23 The substantial flat sur-
face and single pierced quatrefoil of this flyer harmonize
elegantly with the smooth surfaces of the clerestory wall and
simple polyfoil tracery of the Strasbourg clerestory. Finally, of
course, there was the openwork flyer system, whose traceried
insubstantiality perfectly complemented the linearity of the
increasingly influential Rayonnant manner. In this context, it
should not be altogether surprising that the elegantly propor-
tioned but essentially workmanlike forms of the Amiens nave
were abandoned in the later choir and transept campaigns.
THE INTRODUCTION OF OPENWORK FLYERS
AT AMIENS CATHEDRAL
Archaeological investigation of Amiens cathedral clearly dem-
onstrates that the openwork flying buttress scheme was intro-
duced in response to a change of plans rather than as part of a
premeditated differencing intended to convey meaning.24 The
junction between the old and the new work can be found in
the angles between the transept arms and the nave (Figure 6).
An upright forms the base of a ninety-degree angle between
the buttress of the nave and the flyer directed toward the
upper transept. Careful examination of the unit to the north
reveals that it had been set up to receive a conventional solid
flyer directed toward the upper transept, but that in the hiatus
between the construction of the upright and the installation of
AMIENSCATHEDRAL483
BORK/MARK/MURRAY:
the flyer, a change of plans was introduced, involving the .........
deployment of the new openwork unit. The same radical MR
rethinking of the forms of the cathedral can be seen in the
new glazed triforium that appears in the east side of the upper xX:
?mmMm
transept and in the choir as well as in a host of other details,
including window tracery and moldings.
These dramatic changes evidently reflect the replacement
Pj'
of Thomas de Cormont, designer of the upper nave, by his son
Renaud. Despite the scholarly differences that have troubled Iq
fill
MR.

the understanding of the sequence of construction at Amiens,

there is general consensus that Renaud de Cormont was the
Ji?uV.
No.1
designer of the upper transept and choir, and that construc- d'.
tion of these areas was underway in the 1250s and 1260s.25The
1w-
recent cleaning of the cathedral, although destructive to surviv- .... .
?,Nt
N
ing traces of polychromy and to the stone surfaces themselves,
has yielded evidence of the greatest importance in allowing us
... .......... ,4
to date the sequence of the work. We know that Amiens ?v V ;?s
cathedral was damaged by fire in 1258; the cleaning has
rendered the fire-reddened stones visible up to the level of the
choir clerestory arches, showing the damage to be concen-
o
trated on the southeastern crossing pier and adjacent bays.
. .............
Reconstruction followed immediately afterward, when, as is
Bi?
;.?x
known from documentary sources, Renaud was the principal
master mason in charge of the Amiens workshop.26 The
4L
Plow POW,

evidence of the fire-reddened stones suggests that the upper

choir was well along, with at least the southern clerestory
window arches under construction, at the date of the fire.
M,

Renaud de Cormont's decision to modify the forms of

Amiens cathedral should be examined at both the urban and
the personal levels. The middle of the thirteenth century was a
period of change and destabilization in Amiens. The previ-
ously amiable relations between the town and the clergy were
strained as Louis IX levied massive taxes against both groups to
finance his crusade, leading to violent outbursts of anticlerical
sentiment in and around Amiens in the 1240s.27In this period
also, the mendicant orders began to challenge the authority of
he established secular clergy.Although the link between society
and architecture is not always a direct one, the radical stylistic
updating undertaken by Renaud de Cormont may have been
intended to reinforce the prestige of the cathedral as an institu-
tion, even in a period when the church could ill afford the extra
costs of paying workers to carve his more complex forms.
More important, in all likelihood, were Renaud de Cor-
mont's impatience with the conservatism of his father and the
restrictive legacy of Robert de Luzarches, the first Gothic
master of Amiens, and a desire to assert his personal vision.
The father-son relationship provided one of the principal
human bonds holding the masonic community together in
the Middle Ages, imposing certain restraints and incentives
upon the phenomenon of architectural "change." Even in the
absence of blood ties, the relationship between master mason
FIGURE7: Amiens cathedral,the labyrinth
and apprentice would become a surrogate filial bond. The son
or apprentice would learn certain habits of design from his
father/master and would be in a position to extend these
habits in his own work-or to subvert them, as the case may be.
The last great French master mason of the Gothic, Martin
Chambiges, had a son, Pierre, who took his father's "canonic"
design units and put new twists on them, introducing surpris-
ing new optical effects and studied asymmetry.28It is impos-
sible to escape this matrix in explaining the relationship
between Thomas and Renaud de Cormont. Indeed, we might
refer to the very way in which the masons of Amiens cathedral
signed their work to connect this observation to the mythology
of creativity. In 1288 Renaud, by then an old man, incorpo-
rated in the tiles of the nave floor a great decorative labyrinth
with a central plaque recalling the agency of the founding
master, Robert de Luzarches, and the father and son, Thomas
and Renaud de Cormont (Figure 7). The labyrinth was known
in the Middle Ages as the "House of Daedalus."29 Given the
father-son relationship in this case and the subversion of the
paternal work, the son might be characterized metaphorically
as a disobedient Icarus.30

484 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997

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FIGURE8: Amiens cathedral,choir

Whatever the precise nature of his motivations, it is clear
that Renaud de Cormont set out to outdo the work of his
father and put Amiens again at the leading edge of Gothic
design. Renaud must have traveled and worked elsewhere,
learning to appreciate the brittle transparency of Rayonnant
design. In the choir and transept of Amiens, therefore, Re-
naud chose to glaze the triforium. He also animated the mass
of the buttress uprights, or culees, by making them cruciform
rather than rectangular in section, and gave the clerestory
walls of the choir a restless and fragile appearance by placing
pierced gables above the clerestory windows. By adopting the
openwork flying buttress system, probably derived from Troyes,
Renaud made the entire structural system of the transept and
choir conform to the same linearized appearance as the rest of
his work (Figure 8). This aesthetic conformity between struc-
ture and decoration had become de rigeur by the middle of
the thirteenth century, as the examples of Chartres, Reims,
Auxerre, and Strasbourg demonstrate.

BORK/MARK/MURRAY:AMIENS CATHEDRAL 485

 It is possible that Renaud de Cormont was attracted to the
openwork flying buttress system for practical as well as aes-
thetic reasons.As noted above,the solid flyingbuttresspairsof
the Amiens nave function well, now that the building is com-
plete. In the course of construction,however,their relative
massiveness may have been perceived as a distinct disadvantage.
The lightweightof openworkflyerswouldhavepermittedgreat
economies in the use of timber centering, shoring, and scaffold-
ing. To begin with, the centering for the flyers themselves could
be relativelylight, and each unit of centering would have had to
be erected only at one level, rather than two as in the classic
Soissonais system. In addition, the ties and shoring keeping the
clerestorywallsstabilizedafterthe completionof the flyerscould
be kept relativelyslender.This reduced the costs of both the
timber itself and the manpower necessary to handle it. These
economies in turn gave the buildersgreaterflexibilityin plan-
ning the constructionsequence. At Amiens, in particular,it
appears that all the flying buttresses of the transept were com-
pleted before any of the vaults were installed.31 By permitting
more efficientconstructionpractices,openworkflyersmayeven
have paid for the expense of their own manufacture-and
patrons no doubt preferred that their expenditure be reflected
in the lavishness of the final product.
In sum, Renaud de Cormont's decision to employ open-
work flying buttresses cannot be written off as decadent or
foolhardy. Although his radical departure from the precedent
of the Amiens nave may reflect deliberate filial disobedience,
his work deserves to be understood sympathetically as an
attemptto bring the Amiensworkshopbackto the forefrontof
Gothic design and building practice. In adopting the open-
work flyer developed at Troyes, he reaffirmed the characteristi-
cally Gothic drive to aestheticize structure, withoutjourneying
intocompletelyunchartedwaters.
STRUCTURAL PERFORMANCE
OF OPENWORK FLYING BUTTRESS SYSTEMS
Although the openwork flying buttress system had emerged as
an apparently viable alternative to the classic Soissonais system
in the first half of the thirteenth century, Amiens was the last
major building to employ the openwork flyer in its original
form, while the Soissonais system continued to enjoy popular-
ity in such great buildings as Cologne, Metz, and Narbonne.
To understand better the possible technical reasons for the
abandonment of the openwork flyer, we compared the two
systems using LUSAS structural modeling software. The two
models may be taken as simplified representations of the
Amiens upper nave and transept; the format was intentionally
kept fairly generic to facilitate the comparison. The loadings
are taken from an earlier analysis of Amiens, but in this
context it is the qualitative behavior of the two models that we
wish to emphasize.32
486 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997
The first major problem with the openwork flyer scheme
concerns tensile stress in the buttress uprights, or culkes.
Figure 9 shows profiles of maximum tensile stress in the two
models, first under dead weight only, and then with an out-
ward wind load added. Interestingly, the maximum stress
levels in the openwork model are no higher than in the
Soissonais model, and for the most part the areas under tensile
stress (the darkest gray areas) are smaller. Under wind loading,
however, the inward margin of the buttress culke in the
openwork model experiences tension, where it does not in the
nave model. This happens because vault thrusts are carried
into the culke at a higher level by the openwork flyer than by
the lower flyer of the nave system, contributing to a higher
overall bending moment. As we shall see, the overly high
placement of the lower arc in openwork flyers did not escape
the notice of later medieval masons.
The openwork flyer scheme also appears to have permitted
excessively large deformations of the upper clerestory walls. As
examination of Figure 10 reveals, deformations in the model
with openwork flyers are significantly greater than in the
analogously loaded Soissonais model. This difference reflects
the greater flexibility of openwork flying buttresses, com-
pounded once again by the high placement of the flyer, which
bends the culee farther out of vertical alignment while allow-
ing the clerestory wall to bulge out below the buttress. Indeed,
the stresses in the openwork system are low precisely because it
deforms rather than rigidly resisting the imposed loads.
The third major problem with the openwork flying buttress
scheme involves the unforgiving behavior of the mullions
linking the upper and lower chords of the flyer. As shown in
Figure 9, B and D, there are appreciable tensile stresses in
these mullions, related to the flexing of all the buttress ele-
ments under load. This means in practice that the ends of the
mullions tend to pull out of their sockets, and that the mul-
lions themselves tend to crack. Because the cross section of
these tracery elements is so small, the ends of a broken
mullion will typically slide past each other, allowing entire
mullions to slip out of alignment.33 This process could rapidly
destroy the entire tracery screen of an openwork flyer. In solid
flyers, on the other hand, the relatively large contact surfaces
between stones tend to prevent this kind of gross dislocation,
even in regions where the mortar displays extensive tensile
cracking.
PERFORMANCE OF THE OPENWORK FLYERS
AT AMIENS AND EARLIER BUILDINGS
These structural problems manifest themselves clearly both at
Amiens and in related buildings from which the openwork
flyer scheme was derived. Even in the choir of Auxerre, a
relatively low structure with a blind triforium, the flying but-
tress system required extensive repair and rebuilding, both in
 CONTOURSOF S1

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FIGURE9: Contours of maximum tensile stress in LUSASmodels. (A) Solid flyer system under dead load only; (B) openwork flyer system under dead load only; (C) solid flyer

system with outward (left-pointing)wind load added; (D) openwork flyer system with outward (left-pointing)wind load added. The darkestgray areas correspond to tensions on
the order of I atmosphere (I 05 newtons per square meter). The gray scale in these diagramsruns from 70 kilonewtons per square meter tension (0.7E + 05) to 20 kilonewtons

per square meter compression (-0.2E + 05).

BORK/MARK/MURRAY:AMIENS CATHEDRAL 487

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FIGURE 10:Exaggerateddeformation patternsof bothLUSASmodels.(A)Solidflyersystemunderdeadloadonly;(B)openworkflyersystemunderdeadloadonly;(C)solidflyer

windloadadded.
windloadadded;(D) openworkflyersystemwithoutward(left-pointing)
systemwithoutward(left-pointing)

the Middle Ages and in the nineteenth century. A similar story placement of the original nave flyers at Troyes, which appear
unfolded at Troyes, where the flyers of the choir were entirely to have been modeled on those of the choir.34 The changes
rebuilt in the nineteenth century following strengthening made to the nave flyers at his recommendation will be consid-
work in the Middle Ages. In 1362, moreover, a visiting expert ered in greater detail below, in the context of Late Gothic
by the name of Faisant explicitly criticized the overly high flying buttress design. The high choir vessel of St.-Quentin

488 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997

began to deform alarmingly soon after its completion, with the
result that experts were called in.35 As at Troyes, the high
placement of the flyers was explicitly criticized. The building
in its present state now includes fifteenth-century struts that
play the role of the lower flyers in the nave system. Similar zk
1:
struts may have been constructed in the immediate aftermath
of the expertise, only to be replaced in the course of ongoing
.?
Sw.
maintenance work. The truly spectacular deformations of the
St.-Quentin choir clearly illustrate what happens when a flex-
ible structural system is employed in a tall, narrow vessel.
At Amiens, the checkered history of the openwork flyer V
IA
scheme can be traced in some detail. The choir of Amiens has
not deformed as dramatically as St.-Quentin, largely because
of its wider stance. The flyers of the straight bays descend
steeply over two sets of aisles to relatively short culees, recaptur-
ing some of the structural virtues of Bourges, and the loadings
on each flyer of the hemicycle are relatively low. In the
transept, however, where Renaud de Cormont first introduced
the openwork flyer to Amiens, the slender proportions and
broad spans of the structure cause problems of their own. The
crossing piers tend to bow diagonally, displaced inward in their
lower portions by the arcade thrusts of the oversized contigu- Ail
ous bays, and displaced outward in their upper portions by the
thrust of the main crossing vault and its great arches. The
entire upper transept arm on each side, in fact, has a tendency
to shift toward the facades. This deformation provoked revi-
sions in the design of the openwork flyers even as they were
first being built (Figures 11, 12). Thus, to the east of the
transept, the number of vertical mullions in each flyer has I : Amienscathedral,
FIGURE westerntranseptflyers
been doubled-presumably the result of problems experi-
enced during construction. These newly "reinforced" units, something like the lacy effect of the openwork design. In the
however, evidently suffered from the same mullion displace- last decades of the thirteenth century, the designers of the
ment problems as the older ones. Written sources from the upper choir at Cologne sidestepped the structural problems of
late Middle Ages reveal that in the years around 1500 the choir the openwork flyer entirely, choosing instead to decorate the
flyers were rebuilt.36 This late Gothic work is evident in the classic Soissonais system with lacy rows of openwork rosettes
presence of Flamboyant tracery forms mingled with the geo- placed on top of the solid flyers themselves (Figure 13). This
metric elements crowning the openwork panels of the flyers. rejection of the openwork system deserves mention especially
As at St.-Quentin, additional struts were inserted below the because the Cologne upper choir was in other respects so
rebuilt flyers, demonstrating once again that the openwork strongly influenced by the Amiens choir-even the design of
flyers were recognized as being placed too high (Figure 2). In the buttress culkes and their drains seems to have been de-
the course of this rebuilding, any cracked masonry on the rived from the work of Renaud de Cormont.37 By observing a
interior margin of the cul~es would have been replaced, distinction between working structure and decoration, the
eliminating evidence of the tensile stress that would formerly designers of the Cologne choir managed to achieve lavish
have plagued this region. visual effects without sacrificing structural safety.
The Cologne approach may have been perceived by some
AFTERLIFE OF THE OPENWORK Gothic masters as a retreat from what modern writers have
FLYING BUTTRESS SCHEME called structural honesty.38The French Gothic style had, after
Although the flaws of the openwork flying buttress scheme all, been marked by a highly fruitful dialogue between struc-
quickly became apparent, the aestheticization of buttressing tural and aesthetic requirements. Increases in lightness and
structure remained a principal goal of Gothic builders, and a elegance had been accomplished not simply by decorating old
number of interesting variants were soon developed to achieve structural elements, but by developing new ones, such as the

BORK/MARK/MURRAY:AMIENS CATHEDRAL 489

FIGURE12: Amiens cathedral, eastern transept

flyers

flying buttress itself. From this perspective, the development of

the openwork flyer must have seemed like the next logical step
in Gothic structural design, and masons throughout the Middle
Ages set out to make the new system work, addressing the
problems of Amiens and other early buildings directly, rather
than sidestepping them in the manner of Cologne.
One rather conservative approach that retained the spirit
of the openwork flyer, if not its lightness of construction,
involved strengthening the lower arc of the Amiens choir
system until it became in effect a conventional solid flying
buttress. This buttress would perform the same role as the
lower flyer of the Soissonais system, i.e., buttressing the main
vaults. The upper chord of the flyer remained thin and straight,
supported on vertical mullions as at Amiens. This system was
employed in the fourteenth-century nave of Auxerre, prob-
ably in response to observations of distress in the openwork
flyers of the choir.39A much more massive treatment of these
themes may be seen at Limoges cathedral.40 In this extreme
case there are only four thick mullions in each flyer, creating
an overall impression of great bulk.
A more daring approach, which remained closer to the
diaphanous appearance of the first openwork flyers, involved
stiffening the openwork panels with a denser net of tracery.
This was the approach adopted in the fifteenth-century recon-
struction of the nave of Troyes cathedral, following a collapse . . .
.
,
in 1389.41As noted above, the original openwork flyers of the
nave were criticized by the visiting expert Faisant as being too
high. The rebuilt units were lowered, in part by adjusting their
angle of departure from the intermediate culkes. Moreover,
each flyer incorporates a straight chord of tracery tangent to
the lower arc, with a pierced rosette inscribed in the resultant
space near the clerestory wall (Figure 14). This arrangement FIGURE13: Cologne cathedral,choir flyers

490 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER1997

of tracery was probably developed to facilitate construction in
two stages, the lower arc and chord followed by the mullion
zone and upper chord. These features characterize all the
flyers of the Troyes nave, although the long construction time
and the exigencies of reusing some material meant that no two
flyers of the ensemble are exactly alike. In some, the mullions
are vertical, as at Amiens, but the free length of the mullions is
shorter, because the lower chord acts as an anchor against
horizontal displacement. In others, the tracery panels are
tilted to match the overall slope of the buttress, as at Co-
logne.42 Here, too, the characteristic length scale of the trac-
ery elements is significantly smaller than at Amiens, making
the overall structure considerably stiffer and more resistant.
The use of inscribed polyfoils as buttress stiffening elements
may have been inspired by the local church of St. Urbain,
where a similar and even lighter form of openwork flyer
had been deployed in the late thirteenth century. Motivated
by ideals of conformity with the choir, the builders of the
Troyes cathedral nave produced an assortment of openwork
flyers that demonstrate the ongoing attempt to achieve lacy
visual effects and overall lightness without sacrificing struc-
tural safety.
CONCLUSION
Although the origins of the flying buttress have been much
discussed, the later evolution of the form remains too little
studied. The only author to consider the openwork flying
buttress in any systematic way was Viollet-le-Duc. Analysis of his
comments reveals his commitment not only to structural
rationalism, but also to structural honesty. Like many modern-
ist builders and theorists in our own century, he valued the
appearance of functionality as much as the thing itself. He
..
............
.
WI
;4
Nx?
el
...........
Awl
'k
criticized the openwork flying buttresses of the Troyes cathe-
dral nave on formal rather than structural grounds, remark-
ing: "This construction is more clever than graceful, and art is
here completely sacrificed to geometry."43 Similarly, he com-
plained that although builders of such openwork struts were
more knowledgeable than those who built the naves of Char-
tres, Reims, and Amiens, they overreached the mark
in wishing to apply geometric combinations to materials that are in
complete disaccord with their natures, in wishing to treat stone as if it
were wood, in torturing form and even art, in order to give themselves
the puerile satisfaction of making them solve a problem of geometry.
These are examples that are as good to study as they are bad to follow.44
To his credit, Viollet-le-Duc lived up to his own recommenda-
tion by studying the history of openwork flying buttresses with
some care. He recognized, for instance, the overly great flexibil-
ity of the Amiens choir flyers. More important, he understood
that the experience gained in the Amiens choir directly bene-
fited builders of openwork flyers in the fourteenth and fif-
teenth centuries.45 This meant, in effect, that the openwork
flyer evolved according to the same process of trial-and-error
refinement as the "classic" Soissonais buttressing system so
beloved of structural rationalists.
The strengths and limitations ofViollet-le-Duc's perspective
emerge clearly in his statement that "in the fourteenth cen-
tury, the flying buttress had attained its final degree of perfec-
tion from a scientific standpoint: to go further was to engage in
abuse; but the builders of the Middle Ages were not men to
stop themselves in midstream."46 Viollet-le-Duc's recognition
of the essential continuity of medieval design goals was enlight-
ened; but in partitioning this continuous process into a progres-
sive and a decadent stage he put a premium on the appear-
FIGURE14:Troyes cathedral,nave flyers
......
......
vil
BORK/MARK/MURRAY:AMIENS CATHEDRAL 491
ance of "structural honesty," a dubious virtue not necessarily
in accord with his own structural rationalist stance. Having
attained a then unsurpassed understanding of Gothic struc-
ture, Viollet-le-Duc understandably enjoyed a good display of
the principles he himself had enunciated, but his commitment
to these principles made it hard for him to appreciate Late
Gothic architecture. Today, when the reductive critical stan-
dards of modernism have largely given way to postmodern
complexity and contradiction, we may be better equipped to
understand the choices made by Renaud de Cormont and
other medieval masons who wanted their structural systems to
be ornamental as well as functional. Renaud de Cormont may
well have seen practical constructional advantages in the use
of openwork flying buttresses, but he was no doubt also eager
to explore the aesthetic possibilities of shimmering diapha-
nous structure that had been pioneered in the 1240s. As the
history of the openwork flying buttress suggests, the character-
istics of Daedalus and Icarus often went side by side in Gothic
design.
Notes
1On early flying buttresses, see Eugene A. Lef6vre-Pontalis, "L'origine des
arcs boutants," Congr&sarchiologique82 (1919): 367-396; Anne Prache, "Les
arcs-boutants au douzitme si&cle," Gesta 25 (1976): 31-42; Jacques Henriet,
"Recherches sur les premiers arcs boutants. UnJalon: Saint Martin d'Etampes,"
Bulletin monumental136 (1978): 309-323; idem, "La cathedrale Saint-Etienne
de Sens. Le parti du premier maitre et les campagnes du XIIe. sibcle," Bulletin
monumental 140 (1982): 81-174; John James, "The Evidence for Flying But-
tresses before 1180," JSAH 51 (1992): 261-287; Philippe Plaignieux, "Les
arcs-boutants du XIIe si&cle de l'6glise de Domont," Bulletin monumental 150
(1992): 209-222.
2Viollet-le-Duc is the obvious reference here, but his ideas also embrace the
notions of decline and decadence, as explored at the end of this article. See, for
example, Eugene Emanuel Viollet-le-Duc, "Arc Boutant," in Dictionnaire rai-
sonne de l'architecturefranfaisedu XIe au XVIsidcle,10 vols. (Paris), 1: 60-83.
3Willibald Sauerlander, "Modern Gothic: French Gothic Architecture of
the 12th and 13th Centuries by Jean Bony," New YorkReview of Books, 17
November 1984, 43-45; Marvin Trachtenberg, "Gothic/Italian Gothic: To-
ward a Redefinition," JSAH50 (1991): 22-37.
4 For an introduction to the
chronological problems faced by the student of
Amiens cathedral, see Stephen Murray, Notre-Dame,Cathedral of Amiens: The
Powerof Changein Gothic(Cambridge, 1996).
5 Viollet-le-Duc, Dictionnaire,2: 330-331.
6Robert Mark and Ronald S.Jonash, "Wind Loading on Gothic Structure,"
JSAH 29 (1970): 222-230, and Robert Mark, Experimentsin Gothic Structure
(Cambridge, Mass., 1982), 50-57. A structural role for the pinnacles of Amiens
was suggested by the eighteenth-century Amienois antiquarian J.-J. de Court;
quoted in Murray, Notre-Dame,10.
7 Viollet-le-Duc, Dictionnaire,1: 64-65, 71.
8Mark, Experiments,52. A similar hypothesis had earlier been advanced by
John Fitchen in The Constructionof Gothic Cathedrals:A Study of Medieval Vault
Erection(Chicago, 1961), 77.
9 Murray, in Notre-Dame,78-86, argues that Robert de Luzarches, an old man
when he came to Amiens, brought with him an assistant, Thomas de Cormont,
and that the two of them worked together on the lower nave. Thomas effected
a seamless transition to the upper nave on the death of Robert, toward 1230.
10Thus, for George Durand the changes apparent in the forms of the
upper
transept and choir of Amiens are signs of decadence. See Monographiede l'Piglise
Notre Dame, cathidrale dAmiens, 3 vols. (Paris, 1901-1903), 1: 282. For an
intriguing discussion of "truth" and "morality" in architecture, see David
Watkin, Morality and Architecture:The Developmentof a Theme in Architectural
492 JSAH / 56:4, DECEMBER 1997
History and Theoryfrom the GothicRevival to theModernMovement(Oxford, 1977),
esp. 4.
11Robert Venturi,
Complexityand Contradiction in Architecture(New York,
1966).
12For a discussion of wind loading and structural performance at Notre-
Dame, and a reconsideration of the original flying buttress geometry, see
William W. Clark and Robert Mark, "The First Flying Buttresses: A New
Reconstruction of the Nave at Notre-Dame de Paris," Art Bulletin 67 (1984):
47-65.
13 On Bourges, see Robert Branner, La cathidrale de Bourgeset sa place dans
l'architecturegothique (Bourges, 1962). On the efficient design of the Bourges
flyers, see Mark, Experiments,41-47.
14On Soissons, see Carl Barnes, "The Cathedral of Chartres and the
Architect of Soissons," JSAH 22 (1963): 63-74; Jean Ancien, Contributiond
l'Ptudearchiologique:architecturede la cathidrale de Soissons (Soissons, 1984); R.
Pestell, "The Design Sources for the Cathedrals of Chartres and Soissons," Art
History 4 (1981): 1-13; John James, The Template-Makers of the Paris Basin
(Grinstead, Australia, 1989); Bruno Klein, "Chartres und Soissons,
Uberlegungen zur gotischen Architektur um 1200," Zeitschriftfir Kunst-
geschichte49 (1986): 437-466.
15Thejointing scheme may indicate a perceived distinction between actively
carrying members, with radial joints like arches, and members being carried,
with rectangularly coursed joints. In the exceptionally slender flying buttress
system of Beauvais, there is only one radiallyjointed course in each flyer, all the
"fat" having been trimmed away.
16Mark, Experiments,34-47.
17This
arrangement could have been particularly helpful if the high vaults
were installed under the shelter of a previously constructed roof, since the
lower arches of the flyers might serve as relatively lightweight props during the
construction of the upper piers and clerestory wall. The units would then
receive their full charge with the addition of the upper rim and connecting
spokes at the time of the installation of the high vaults.
18
They also refer to dado arcades and to "micro-architecture" in general.
19John Onians, BearersofMeaning: The Classical Ordersin Antiquity,theMiddle
Ages, and theRenaissance(Princeton, 1988).
20Norbert Bongartz, "Die friuhen Bauteile der Kathedrale in
Troyes. Archi-
tekturgeschichtliche Monographie," Ph.D. diss., Freiburg/Breisgau, 1973, esp.
232-244, where the author suggests a point of origin in Troyes and subsequent
deployment at Amiens, St.-Quentin, and Auxerre.
21Harry B. Titus, Jr., "The Auxerre Cathedral Chevet and
Burgundian
Gothic Architecture," JSAH47 (1988): 45-56.
22Pierre H61iot, La Basilique de St.-Quentinet l'architecturedu
moyendge (Paris,
1967), and Ellen Shortell, "The Collegiate Church of St.-Quentin," Ph.D. diss.,
Columbia University, in progress.
23Louis Grodecki, "Les arcs boutants de la cathedrale de Strasbourg et leur
orgine," Gesta15 (1976): 43-51.
24Murray, Notre-Dame,67-68.
25Ibid., 82-86.
26Archives d6partementales de Somme, G
194, charter dated 1260 mention-
ing the house of "magistri Renaudi cementarii "
27 William C. Jordan, Louis IX and the ..
Challenge of the Crusade (Princeton,
1979). In 1244 in Amiens municipal officers imprisoned, tortured, and ex-
ecuted certain clerks accused of a minor crime--typical of a number of such
anticlerical incidents from these decades.
28Stephen Murray, Beauvais Cathedral:Architectureof Transcendence(Prince-
ton, 1989).
29The existing labyrinth together with its central plaque and inscription is a
nineteenth-century replica. The original inscription, " Memoire quant l'euvre
de l'eglise de cheens fu commenchie .. ," is recorded in Archives d~partemen-
tales de Somme, G 2975. The inscription describes the labyrinth as the "maison
dedalus."
30 On the labyrinth as a symbol of creativity and the relation between
Daedalus and Icarus, see Joseph L. Koerner, Die Suche nach dem Labyrinth,Der
Mythosvon Daidalusund Ikarus (Frankfurt am Main, 1983).
31The evidence for the slightly later construction of the transept vaults lies
in the use of a square-nosed fillet for the diagonal ribs rather than the more
old-fashioned almond shape. In the case of the well-documented construction
of the Troyes upper nave we can even find a conversation about the relative
priority of the flyers and vaults in the sequence of construction. It was decided
at Troyes to build all the flyers first and the vaults subsequently. It also appears
at Troyes that the lower arches of the eastern nave flyers belong to an earlier
phase of construction than the vertical panels and upper rims; see Stephen
Murray, Building TroyesCathedral(Bloomington, 1987). Anne Prache, in "Re-
marques sur les parties hautes de la cath6drale d'Amiens," Gazettedes Beaux-
Arts, February 1996, 55-62, has also argued that the vaults of Amiens (particu-
larly those of the choir) were installed well after the completion of the upper
walls. Recent dendrochronological analysis of the roof has indicated a date
after 1284 for the choir roof. This chronology for the present roof need not
imply that the nave vaults were built significantly later than the walls, since a
temporary roof of some sort could have protected the vaults in the interim.
There is no archaeological evidence in the tas-de-charge area of the Amiens
nave to suggest that the vaults were built later than the walls.
32The models show only the wall structure, but the loadings include vault
loads and high-wind loads on the roof as well as the dead weight of the buttress
structure and wind load on the clerestory. The piers and buttress cul6es are
taken to be fixed at the level of the triforium base, and the connection between
the two walls of the building are treated as negligible. The models do, however,
take into account the differing thicknesses of the buttress members. The wind
loadings are adapted from Mark, Experiments,25, for a 90-mile-per-hour wind at
roof level, resulting in a force per bay at the wall head of 25,000 pounds and an
overall force per bay on the clerestory wall of 44,000 pounds.
33The mullions of openwork flyers, like those of window tracery, are typically
attached to the surrounding structure with metal pins. Dislocation can still
occur, however, whenever the mullions crack in the middle and whenever
weathering erodes the mullion tips around the pins.
34Quoted in Murray, Troyes,30-32 and 121, "Item, further, it seems that the
said master [Pierre Faisant] who has looked at the newwork of MasterJehan de
Torvoie and it seems to him that there is no fault, except that the flying
buttresses [ars bouterez]are placed too high " Figures 9, 10. Graphics produced by Robert Bork
35Hl61iot,La basiliquede Saint-Quentin,71....
36Amiens, biblioth&que municipale, MS 563, 226ro-229ro.
37 Helen Rosenau, Der KolnerDom: seine Baugeschichteund historischeStellung
(Cologne, 1931), 67-68.
38Robert Mark, Light, Wind, and Structure (Cambridge, Mass., 1990), 3-7,
179; and Watkin, Moralityand Architecture.
39Harry B. Titus, Jr., "The Architectural History of Auxerre Cathedral,"
Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 1984.
40 Most of the
building's flying buttresses date from the nineteenth century.
The nave had been left as a fragment in the late Middle Ages, and the choir
flyers were rebuilt as part of the same nineteenth-century campaigns that saw
the completion of the nave. The form of all these nineteenth-century flyers,
however, echoes that adopted in the fragmentary Late Gothic nave. This
original nave flyer, along with the general disposition of Limoges cathedral
before restoration, can be seen in an 1837 engraving by J. B. Tripon. See
Michael Davis, "Le choeur de la cathedrale de Limoges: tradition et innovation
dans la carriare de Jean des Champs," Bulletin archiologiquedu Comitides travaux
historiqueset scientifiques,nouv. s6r., 22, 1989, 99.
41 Murray, Troyes,33-34 and 77-79.
42These units with tilted tracery were the work of Master Jehangon Gar-
nache from the 1490s. Murray, Troyes,75-86.
43Viollet-le-Duc, Dictionnaire,1: 78.
44Ibid., 77.
45Ibid., 72.
46 Ibid., 76.
IllustrationCredits
Figures 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14. Photographs by Stephen Murray
Figure 3. After Robert Branner
Figure 4. Photograph by A. Scibilia
Figure 13. After Paul Clemen

BORK/MARK/MURRAY: AMIENS CATHEDRAL 493