It has been said many times here and elsewhere that building activity all over Europe during the late Middle Ages was negligible in comparison with the great attention the other arts were receiving; this was unquestionably so, if this period in architecture is compared with building under the patronage of the Church during the early and high gothic periods, or with the building activity of the Tuscan city-states during the late thirteenth and the first half of the fourteenth century. Yet like all such generalizations, such a statement needs modification for, as has been shown in the previous chapter, the second half of the fourteenth century was a brilliant period for architecture in England, particularly in London. The greatest significance of the period between 1360 and 1450 in the field of architecture, even in England, may, however, prove to rest not so much with new, large-scale building requiring a new approach, as with finding technically and aesthetically satisfactory solutions for the long-postponed completion of old buildings.

To the new tasks belonged the designing of open, elegant town houses and comfortable manors, college buildings and well-lit spacious guild- and manorial halls. In order to provide the latter, the master carpenters of England contributed the single-arched open-timbered roof with solid abutments but omitting posts and tie beams, a style of roofing that was soon taken up in other northern countries. Open space and a maximum of light were in demand also in church architecture, partly in response to new liturgical customs with emphasis on communal services and preaching, but surely also in response to aesthetic preference. The single-aisle nave as well as the three-aisle nave of uniform height without transept, known from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries but restricted in use, were now used widely everywhere; for the time being, at least, the symbolism of the cruciform transept seemed forgotten.

It was at this time that, between 1377 and 1400, the nave at Canterbury was built, replacing the ancient Norman nave. Work on the nave of Westminster Abbey was resumed about 1362, adding to the existing five eastern bays and the choir of more than a hundred years earlier. Both naves were built by Henry Yevele, one of the great gothic architects, who was both technically and artistically admirably suited for such enormous tasks. (1) Harvey presents an excellent general review of building activity in England during the fourteenth century. From him also comes the information concerning the choir of Gloucester Abbey (later to become a cathedral church) and the development in England of the open trussed roof.). With equal elegance and apparent ease, various high-gothic naves were provided with new, open, glass-filled choirs, such as the perpendicular choir of Gloucester Abbey, built between 1337 and 1349. Towers of great weight and proportions were built, often replacing old ones, on old foundations, and new portals with new sculpture were added to severe old entrances. (2) Under ordinary circumstances such a task was probably simple enough, as may be judged from a contract for the building of the nave of the church at Fotheringhay, in Northamptonshire. However, there are records which tell of wrong starts, of complications arising from a discrepancy between the lack of theoretical knowledge and the ambitiousness of plans which, unless first-rate advice could be obtained, led to the dragging on of work. This of course was the case at the cathedral of Siena, where discussions, expertises, recriminations and an infinite waste of time, material and money went on for almost a century.

The records of the deliberations in the opening years after the resumption of the construction of the cathedral of Florence and those of the decisive years near the beginning of the construction of the cathedral of Milan tell of the thinking and the procedures applied under different circumstances in the step by step planning of the gothic builder. Excerpts of these debates are given here. A document of 1417 concerning the cathedral of Gerona in Spain shows still another way of settling such problems, displaying once more an attempt to arrive at the most satisfactory solution, keeping structural safety and economy in balance with an aesthetically ideal solution.

In 1434, a contract for building the nave of Fotheringhay church was made between William Wolston, squire, and Thomas Pecham, clerk, representatives of the duke of York, and William Horwood, a master mason of Fotheringhay. (3)

The said William Horwood has agreed to undertake and by this contract has expressed his intention, consent and willingness to make a new nave for the collegiate church of Fotheringhay to be joined to the choir and of same height and breadth as the said choir; and in length 80 feet from the said choir within the walls, a measuring yard of England always accounting for three feet. And by this covenant the said William Horwood shall also execute to satisfaction all the groundwork for the nave: void it at his own cost as well as lay the masonry foundation as durable as it ought to be, under supervision of masters of that craft, the material being sufficiently provided for him at the expense of my lord, as such an undertaking requires. And to this nave he shall add two aisles and take the ground and void it in the manner as said before, the two aisles to correspond in height and width to those of the choir and in height to that of the nave, the foundation for both nave and aisles to be made of rough stone underneath the flat stones of the pavement; and from the pavement upward the rest of the nave and aisle walls to the full height of the choir shall also be altogether of clean-hewn ashlar on the exterior; the interior walls shall be of rough stone except for the flatstone of the base of the window sills, of the piers and the capitals on which the arches and the pendants will rest, all of which shall be altogether of freestone worked truly and duly as it ought to he.

And in each side aisle there shall be windows of freestone similar in all points to the windows of the choir, except that they shall not have any moldings. And at the west end of both aisles he shall make a window consisting of four lancets agreeing in everything with the windows of the aisles. Each aisle wall shall have in all its length an overhanging indented parapet of freestone on top, both battlements to abut against the steeple [crossing tower?]. And each aisle shall have six mighty buttresses of dressed freestone; and each buttress shall be topped by a finial corresponding in every respect to the finials of the choir, except that the buttresses of the nave shall be larger, stronger and more powerful than the buttresses of the choir.

And the clerestory both inside and out shall be made of smooth ashlar stone and it shall rest on ten mighty piers each with four attached half-columns, the two upper ones connecting with the choir and the two lower ones joining with the nave. And adjoining the attached upper half-columns at a right angle shall be two perpendicular walls of freestone, cleanly wrought, one on either side of the central door to the choir; and either wall shall have a window of three lancets and there shall be a water basin on either side of this wall which shall serve four others, that is, one on each of the opposite ends of this middle door of the choir and one on either end facing the aisles.

And each of said side aisles shall have five bays rising above the steeple [crossing tower?], each bay having a window and every window four lancets, identical in all points with the windows of the clerestory of the choir. And both aisles shall have six mighty arches butting on either side against said steeple, similar to the arches of the choir both with respect to tablestone and the crest, with a square battlement on top.

And on the north side of the church the said William Horwood shall make a porch, the outside to be of smooth ashlar, the inside of rough stone 12 feet long and as wide as the nave buttresses will allow, and as high as the side aisle, with reasonable lights on either side and with a square battlement above.

And on the south side of the church, facing the cloister, there shall be another porch adjoining the door of the cloister, having such width as the buttresses will allow and a height somewhere between that of the church [door] and the said cloister door, with a door on the west side of said porch toward the town; on either side as many windows as need be; and a square battlement above of a height according to the rest.

And at the west end of the nave there shall be a steeple rising high above the church on three strong and mighty arches wrought of stone, which steeple will be 80 feet high above the ground, according to the measuring yard of three feet to the yard. It shall be made of tablestone and it shall measure 20 square feet within, the walls rising from the ground at a thickness of 6 feet. And up to the height of the nave the steeple shall be square, with two mighty buttresses strengthening it on either side of a large door which shall be at the west end of the steeple.

And when the steeple reaches the level of the battlements it shall change into eight sides and at every joint there shall be a buttress decorated with a finial, the finials to correspond to those of the choir and the nave, this upper spire to be surrounded with a large square battlement. Above the door of the said steeple there shall be a window rising in height as high as the great vault of the steeple and in width as the nave will permit. And the said steeple shall have two floors and from each floor eight clerestory windows shall rise, set in the middle of each side, each window consisting of three lancets; the outside of the steeple is to be of smooth freestone and the inside of rough stone. And the steeple shall contain a vaulted passage serving the nave, the aisles and the choir both on the lower as well as on the upper level. Finally, all other necessary work should be done which belongeth to such a nave, aisles, steeple and porches, whether or not it is included in this contract.

And for all the work included and enumerated in this contract my lord of York will provide the building material and transportation, that is to say, stone, lime, plumb-rules, ropes, bolts, ladders, wood, scaffolds, gins [hoisting devices] and all manner of material that belongs to the said work. For this work, to be carried out well, faithfully and duly and to be finished in the way as planned and declared above, the said William Horwood will receive £300 sterling, which he shall be paid in the following manner: when he will have prepared the ground for the said church, aisles, buttresses, porches and steeple, cut and set his stones for the foundation and will have built upon it the wall inside and out as it ought to be well and duly made, then he shall receive £6. 13. 4. And when the said William Horwood will have set 000 feet above the foundation, both on the outside and on the inside of said work, then he shall receive payment of £'100 sterling; and so for every foot of the said work until it is fully completed as it ought to be, and as it is planned, until it comes to the full height of the highest of the finials and battlements of the church, the hewing, setting and raising of the steeple until it has reached beyond the highest battlement of the said body, he will have received all but 30s. sterling, which shall be paid to him when the work is fully completed and made in the manner as heretofore devised.

And when all the above-enumerated work is fully completed as it ought to be and as it is laid out in this agreement between the said agents and the said William, then the said William Horwood shall receive full payment of the said £300 sterling if any remain unpaid and due to him. And during all the said work the said William Horwood shall employ neither more nor fewer freemasons, rough setters or layers than the number ordained and assigned to him by those who under my lord of York shall be charged to be the administrators and the overseers of the said construction.

* Teresa G. Frisch, Gothic Art 1140 - c. 1450: Sources and Documents, University of Toronto Press in association with the Medieval Academy of America, 1987.

(1) John Hooper Harvey, Henry Yevele, c. 1320 to 1400: The Life of an English Architect (London: B. T. Batsford, Ltd., 1944.

(2) One example is the reconstruction of the south portal of the cathedral of Rodez and the all-out effort in 1448 by the chapter of the cathedral to decorate it with 108 or more stone statues and with "stories," and the modified execution of this plan in 1456, when the original sculptor, Jacques Maurel, departed the city without taking leave; Victor Mortet, Melanges d'archeologie, Ser. 2 (1915), pp. 159-66.

(3) Douglas Knoop and G. P. Jones, The Mediaeval Mason (3rd. edition, revised and reset, 1967), published by Manchester University Press, Appendix II, pp. 220ff. The publishers have kindly granted me permission to use the original text in making the modern English version given here.