FG Bautechnikgeschichte
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Research profile line
The vaults over the choir and nave of Notre‐Dame in Paris play a key role in the development of Gothic vaults—regarding their sheer height and span, and in particular their complex stone structure. A considerable dynamic in the development of new construction details can be seen in solutions that in some cases are still quite distinct from the well‐known constructions of the great Gothic vaults, and that in other cases, although innovative, remain more or less singular. The design of the sexpartite vaults follows a scheme established in the early Gothic and at the same time displays groundbreaking conceptions in geometry and construction. The fire of the roof that in 2019 damaged part of the vaults, but also showed their remarkable structural performance, brought up the necessity of better understanding these structures while also giving deep insight into construction details. The ongoing research presented here correlates geometric analyses based on 3D‐scanning, carried out on the vaults in Notre‐Dame and on comparable structures, observations on construction details on site, and sources such as historical drawings, with large‐scale experiments reproducing the processes of construction, fabrication of building elements, as well as planning and information transfer from design to building. The approach that refers to the built object as its principal source can be characterized as reverse engineering.
The former Jesuit Church of St. Nicholas in the Lesser Town of Prague (Sv. Mikuláš na pražské Malé Straně), is considered the masterpiece of the two Prague-based members of the Dientzenhofer family of master builders, Christoph (1655–1722) and Kilian Ignaz (1689–1751), father and son. Christoph’s new vault concept of double-curved pairs of arches, although being the starting point for a new stream within Baroque architecture, was realized but not completely finished. Decades later, his son completed the building to his own unique design, drastically remodeling the existing vaults.
This study seeks to determine what this change in architectural expression means at the level of vault geometry and construction. Using a laser scan of the building as the primary source, the complex vault geometry based on circle segments was analyzed with the help of Reverse Geometric Engineering, and the construction techniques, centering and alterations to the building’s fabric were described and interpreted by means of precise extrados plans. This made it possible to reconstruct the original vault design, providing a significant contribution to long-debated questions of architectural history. Furthermore, the different approaches to vault design and construction taken by Christoph and Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer respectively, were clarified, showing how Kilian Ignaz utilized simpler geometry and centering but achieved more advanced structural details than his father.
The Friday Mosque of Isfahan is one of the Iran’s most prominent monuments and one of the great masterpieces in the history of architecture, in particular of the construction of complex vaults. The mosque is built around a central courtyard crowned by several vaults and two dome chambers in the main axis of the complex. The southern domed chamber, known as the dome of Nizām al-Mulk the powerful Persian vizier (1018-1092), built under the rule of Malikshāh the Seljuq (1072-92) in front of the qibla wall. The building marks a significant point in the history of Iranian architecture. Spanning about 15m and reaching a height of 26.54m at the inner apex, it is the largest masonry dome constructed in the Islamic world until that time. As well as the addition of an iwan to the northern edge of the chamber, facing to the central yard, the concept of a dome and iwan would serve as a model for many mosque architecture during the Seljuqs until the end of the 12th century AD. While previous investigations of the building were primarily archaeological, this study focusses on the structure and construction of the dome. This includes the masonry arches of the hall, the transitional zone, and in particular the dome itself that shows a unique combination of ribs and shells. The investigations are carried out on the basis of a new survey. The geometric analyses enabled us to reconstruct the structure of the dome.
The principles of the geometric design and construction of Gothic vaults mark a fundamental shift in vault conception. In reality, the underlying geometric conceptions were established well before the Gothic, and the relation to the development of rib vaults is more complex than it has been generally assumed.
The vaults in Speyer Cathedral, one of the most prominent church buildings in the Middle Ages, are exemplary for innovative vault design in the eleventh century. Moreover, here the first high vaults were built over a large church nave, and the first cross vaults with diagonal ribs appear. We intend to show the key position in the history of medieval vault construction, regarding the geometric design as well as the new structural system. The impact can be shown in prominent vaulted structures from the early Gothic, in particular the nave of the Cathedral of Angers and the high vaults in Notre-Dame in Paris. The study is based on surveys, 3-D-Scans, and geometric analyses, aiming to understand design and construction of the vaults, the details of the masonry and stonework, as well as the structural elements.
In the context of the historical development of applied geometry we also discuss the role of stereotomy in the architecture of the cathedral. This raises the question of the origins of the canon of design exercises that is connotated with Early Modern treatises of architecture.
The relative chronology and ideas behind development in medieval building services are often difficult to prove. Especially concerning the High Middle Ages, the acquisition of knowledge is hindered not only by the large amount of unpublished unknown or destroyed objects, but also by the lack of written sources. With the two towers of Besigheim in southern Germany, well-preserved examples of stately architecture extant to this day. A detailed Building Archeological survey of them can offer us a regionally and temporally fixed insights into building services, their variations and the ideas which underpinned them.
The cathedrals and lavish secular buildings of the high medieval era bear witness to the level of skill with which heavy ashlars were hoisted and laid by the contemporary craftsmen. However, due to the lack of sources like treatises and naturalistic depictions we know comparably little about the cranes they used. To refine our knowledge of high medieval cranes this paper discusses their construction and technical capabilities based around preserved machines and finds examined with the methods of building archaeology.
Christoph Dientzenhofer (1655–1722) is considered one of the most important Baroque master builders of Central Europe. From his extensive architectural oeuvre, a group of six church buildings with geometrically complex forms stands out, recognised by architectural historians as particularly innovative and influential. These churches, located in Bohemia (Czech Republic), and often collectively referred to as the ‘radical’, ‘dynamic’, ‘Guarinesque’, or simply ‘Bohemian’ group, are: St. Joseph in Obořiště (1702–11), the Castle Church in Smiřice (1702–11), St. Nicholas in the Lesser Town of Prague (1703–11), St. Clare in Cheb (1707–11), St. Margaret in Břevnov (1708–16), and the Church of the Holy Assumption in Nová Paka (1709–24). The brick vaults of these six buildings, sequences of oval domes and double-curved vault areas, are of particular interest for building research. In this study, the geometric design of the vaults of Dientzenhofer’s ‘radical’ churches is documented, analysed, and compared using 3D laser scans of the buildings as primary source. The 3D models generated from the scans enable a geometric analysis through the method of reverse geometric engineering, breaking down the vaults’ complex three-dimensional forms into their basic two-dimensional components: segments of circles with different radii and orientations, curved in one or two directions. These forms can be found in the architectural and stereotomic treatises that were widespread at the time. By comparing the vault geometry of the six churches with each other and with the geometric concepts discussed in the treatises, general statements can be made about the architect’s design choices. On the basis of this investigation, hypotheses are made about the design and underlying geometric ideas of the vaults of Dientzenhofer’s ‘radical group’, and the results are placed in context.
Some considerations on the early development of cross vaults and rib vaults in medieval architecture
(2023)
The fundamental shift in the geometric design of cross vaults that gave way to the development of Gothic vaults is usually associated with the introduction of cross ribs built with cut stone. And it is generally assumed that the development of the rib vault occurred in Norman architecture shortly before 1100, from where it was introduced to early Gothic vault architecture. In particular, the requirements of stone planning in the ribs has been interpreted as a guiding feature of the geometric design of the vaults.
However, surveys and geometric analyses carried out in some prominent vaulted structures suggest that this innovation in the geometric concept of vaults may have taken place at an earlier date, and that this development has a more complex relation to the use of ribs than it has been generally assumed. We discuss this in case studies on the geometric concept of the cross vaults in the Palatine Chapel at Aachen and in the two medieval building phases of Speyer Cathedral. In the latter, archaeological evidence shows that in the complex, wide spanned high vault of the nave one original bay still survives from the late 11th century. The research in progress on the earliest known rib vaults in central European architecture also raises questions regarding the early history of stereotomy.
In the lack of written or graphic sources about the design and building technology in these structures, the built object is an essential source for understanding the decision-making processes in planning of complex spatial structures stable by their shape. The interpretation of the geometric data and the evidence from building archaeology gives an insight also on the background of knowledge in the design of highly demanding spatial structures in the middle-ages.