Building the cathedral

 Planning

A master mason would have had a good idea of the kind of building needed having worked on other sites, especially if on a cathedral in France. He would have gained experience and known what was innovative. He would then have to obtain agreement with the bishop. However, much of the design formed as the work progressed. An upper room in York Minster has plaster on the floor with drawings of bits of the cathedral stonework and it is thought this was how the setting out was done. There would have been many wooden templates made to give consistency of shape.

Geometry

Master masons would know much about geometry and ratios that give a pleasing appearance. He would know about unit lengths including the perch or rod length. The second cathedral had dimensions based on a perch length of 15 feet; see the post, ‘It is short perch; historians please note.’ The current cathedral east end has some suggestion with a long perch of 18 feet and the west end nave has a medium perch length of 16.5 feet. Most dimensions followed a formula, though this changed with architectural styles. For example. the three levels in the nave, ground floor arches, triforium and clerestory, have a harmonious ratio of close to 2:1:1, which is also seen at Westminster Abbey and Beverley Minster. That meant the ground storey occupied one-half of the total height.^[1] It was said to show a ‘smooth fluidity of upward movement.’

 

Nave wall showing general ratio of elements. The original lengths were likely to be a rod or perch, but that is difficult to prove with changes to the floor level and roof.

 

Another ratio was the width of the nave and aisles (21 m or 68 feet) which is close to half of its length (43 m or 140 feet) and all but the western columns are 16.5 feet (one modern perch) wide from centre to centre. The width between the columns right through to the high altar is 30 feet (two short perches).

            Another easy calculation was to make a perfect square by having a diagonal  equal to 1.4 x length of a side. Since the nave is two squares each with a wall length of 68 feet, ensuring the nave is built absolutely square could have meant the diagonal had to be 95 feet. The crossing is a square of 30 feet so the diagonal had to be 42 feet. The nave is 8 bays in length and so is the east end from the crossing to the Lady Chapel, so this arm of the cathedral is also two squares in area. There is a simplicity of shape based on simple geometry.

     Archways for doors and windows became pointed and known as an equilateral arch based on two intersecting circles. Pointed arches began at Abbot Suger’s cathedral of St. Denis in Paris and were quickly taken up in England. When compared with round arches, the pointed arch was more effective in distributing the force of heavier ceilings.

 

Arches drawn with two intersecting arcs. Different widths of arch arose from changing the point of centre.

  Building the foundation

Usually, a trench was dug out of the bedrock and filled with burnt limestone and sand mortar between rubble stone. When aboveground the foundation was shuttered between wooden panels which left a mark on the side of the mortar. The third cathedral was built around the outside of the second cathedral and probably the only shuttering needed was on the outside. Much of the rubble must have come from the upper walls of the second cathedral. Decorative stone has been found in the north nave wall foundation, second bay, which must have been recycled.

 

Plan of the cathedral showing there was much building with the second cathedral to give support and building material for the foundation of the third cathedral.

Building the walls

Much stone was pre-shaped at the quarry. The quality of the stone was selected by the master mason. Much stone came from the quarry at Hopwas and was probably carried by a cart drawn by oxen or horses. Stones were laid with a thin layer of mortar (burnt limestone and sand). Lime mortar takes a long time in years to set and this allows the wall to settle; it is unlike modern mortar which acts like a glue.

Columns were extra-large in girth, indeed were over-engineered with up to 100 tonnes weight on a square metre of foundation. The weight of the roof was around 3% of this total weight of wall and columns, which indicates a wide margin of thrust.

Ropes and pulleys were used to raise up small fashioned stone. Sometimes a winch was used which was a lifting device consisting of a rope or chain winding round a horizontal rotating drum. For very large stone a windlass was used which consisted of a large wheel or drum turned by several labourers. The windlass could lift stone ten times more in weight than the men turning the wheel.

Wild Mare tread-wheel used to build a tall spire at St James Church in Louth, Lincolnshire, in 1515. The men were paid 3d per day for its use.

It is thought as many as 200 labourers would be working on the site. At Westminster Abbey in 1253 between 3 and 400 workers were involved. Including those fashioning the stone at the quarries and transporting it possibly needed 6 to 800 men.[2] Some labourers would be allowed to climb ladders and work off the timber scaffold. Woodworkers would be in number. Blacksmiths were needed to make tools and the ironwork sometimes used to strap the stonework. There would be masons shaping the stone away from the site and labourers taking the stone at the quarry. All needed to be housed and fed. Labourers would have probably conversed in Old English, the masons in French and the priests in Latin. This diversity suggests there was a community entirely devoted to building cathedrals. Much knowledge passed down through families.

 

King Dagobert visiting the construction site of Saint-Denis "Les Grandes Chroniques de France". 15th century, Bibliothèque nationale de France. Wikimedia, Public Domain.

 Building an arch

A wooden frame was made to a size that would support an arch. Shaped stone or voussoirs in blocks were placed over the frame until the top, middle keystone was inserted. The frame was then removed. The shape caused the thrust of each stone to be inwards and this held it together. There was no need for a buttress on the outside since the downward pressure was inwards. ‘Y’ shaped grooves in the hidden side of the voussoirs were made to hold molten lead and this was a way to set rigid the arch.

 

Centring frame to build an arch

 

Building a vault

A diagonal wooden frame was used. The rib voussoirs were placed on the frame and the keystone added to lock it in place. Once the ribs were completed a new frame was constructed for placing thin, shaped stone in the spaces (severies or panels) between the ribs. Large bosses were sculpted for the centre key stone and they masked any deviation from the diagonal. The thrust of the ribs was downwards onto piers and not on the wall.

 

Centring frame for a vault

Building a roof

A tall timber scaffold was constructed from the floor to the roof and a platform of wood placed across the top. On this was built the wooden frames for the vaulting ribs and then the severies. Removing the frame would be by have a block of wood at the base which had a hollowed base. By sawing down at the three lines, the block dropped a small amount. This would allow the frames on the platform to be removed. The whole scaffold was then moved to the next bay and a new vault constructed.

 

Support scaffold for adding a roof

 

Master Masons

Master masons were the esteemed developers of cathedrals and were highly paid and well looked after. They had to be able to manage a large team of workers and coordinate the delivery of materials and supplies. Some master masons working on the cathedral have been named. Work on the south transept, c. 1220, was under Thomas the Elder. He also supervised the building of the chapterhouse, 1240s. There are various master masons with this name and especially an esteemed mason working on Westminster Abbey in the 14th-century. The nave was presumably directed by Thomas Waleys (Wallace) master of the fabric in 1268, who had succeeded William Fitzthomas by this date. It is possible Bishop Langton employed Henry Ellerton, master of the king's works, as his master mason to build a castellated boundary wall, 15 m high, with battlements around the Close. It had two fortified gates, four large towers and a moat and ditch. William Franceys has been suggested as the master-mason employed by Langton for the Lady Chapel and he might possibly have been a Frenchman.^[2] For Langton’s palace it was recorded Master Walter was the carpenter and Master Hugh de la Dale the mason.

 

Supposed face of Walter de Ramessey, a master mason engaged in 1337 to join the extension of the choir with the old choir so that the continuation was masked. Walter was a ‘King’s Mason’ and this face Is on the east side of the capital of the pillar by the north gate of the choir.[3]

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] P. Brieger, The Oxford History of English Art (1216–1307), (Oxford: 1957), 185.

[i2] D. Carpenter, Henry III. The rise to power and personal rule 1207–1258. (New Haven and London: 2020), 336.

[3] Is Franceys a corruption of France? J. Harvey, English Medieval Architects. (Stroud: 1984) 105 conjectured if the master builder was William of Eyton instead.

[4]  H. E. Savage, The fourteenth century builders, Unpub. article in Cathedral Library, (1916), 22.