IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0280945.html

Notre-Dame de Paris: The first iron lady? Archaeometallurgical study and dating of the Parisian cathedral iron reinforcements

Author

Listed:
  • Maxime L’Héritier
  • Aurélia Azéma
  • Delphine Syvilay
  • Emmanuelle Delqué-Kolic
  • Lucile Beck
  • Ivan Guillot
  • Mathilde Bernard
  • Philippe Dillmann

Abstract

The study of iron reinforcements used in the construction of Notre-Dame de Paris offers a glimpse into the innovation that took place on this building site in the mid-12th century, adapting metal to create a novel architecture. The restoration of the monument after the 2019 fire offered unique possibilities to investigate its iron armatures and to sample 12 iron staples from different locations (tribunes, nave aisles and upper walls). Six of them were dated thanks to the development of an innovative methodology based on radiocarbon dating. They reveal that Notre-Dame is the first known Gothic cathedral where iron was massively used as a proper construction material to bind stones throughout its entire construction, leading to a better understanding of the master masons’ thinking. Moreover, a metallographic study and slag inclusion chemical analyses of the staples provide the first study of iron supply for a great medieval Parisian building yard, renewing our understanding of iron circulation, trade and forging in the 12th and 13th century capital of the French kingdom. The highlighting of numerous welds in all iron staples and the multiple provenances sheds light on the activity of the iron market in this major medieval European city and the nature of the goods that circulated, and questions the possible importance of recycling.

Suggested Citation

  • Maxime L’Héritier & Aurélia Azéma & Delphine Syvilay & Emmanuelle Delqué-Kolic & Lucile Beck & Ivan Guillot & Mathilde Bernard & Philippe Dillmann, 2023. "Notre-Dame de Paris: The first iron lady? Archaeometallurgical study and dating of the Parisian cathedral iron reinforcements," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(3), pages 1-34, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0280945
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0280945
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0280945
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0280945&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0280945?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John A. List & Craig A. Gallet, 1999. "The Kuznets Curve: What Happens After the Inverted‐U?," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(2), pages 200-206, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dessart, Laurence & Standaert, Willem & Schyns, Michael & Mazurova, Elena, 2026. "When the past meets the future: VR-evoked nostalgia as a pathway to subjective wellbeing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:kap:iaecre:v:17:y:2011:i:4:p:465-475 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Bourguignon, Francois, 2005. "The Effect of Economic Growth on Social Structures," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 27, pages 1701-1747, Elsevier.
    3. Marie Caroline Momo & Andre Ledoux Njouonkou & Lucie Felicite Temgoua & Romuald Djouda Zangmene & Junior Baudoin Wouokoue Taffo & Mama Ntoupka, 2018. "Land-Use/Land-Cover Change and Anthropogenic Causes Around Koupa Matapit Gallery Forest, West-Cameroon," Journal of Geography and Geology, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 10(2), pages 1-56, June.
    4. Janice M. Glime, 2024. "Roles of Bryophytes in Forest Sustainability—Positive or Negative?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(6), pages 1-70, March.
    5. Lonnie Stevans & David Sessions, 2001. "Minimum Wage Policy and Poverty in the United States," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 65-75.
    6. Eynard, Benoît & Gallet, Thomas & Roucoules, Lionel & Ducellier, Guillaume, 2006. "PDM system implementation based on UML," Mathematics and Computers in Simulation (MATCOM), Elsevier, vol. 70(5), pages 330-342.
    7. repec:kap:iaecre:v:16:y:2010:i:4:p:410-418 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Sébastien Breau & Annie Lee, 2023. "The evolution of the Kuznets curve in Canada," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(4), pages 709-735, August.
    9. Andreas Stoller & Martin Huber, 2026. "Effect of Cigarette Price and Tax Increases on Smoking in Europe: A Difference-in-Differences Study with Double Machine Learning," Papers 2604.05841, arXiv.org.
    10. repec:isu:genstf:202502111727480000 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Bonnet, Céline & Bouamra-Mechemache, Zohra & Réquillart, Vincent & Treich, Nicolas, 2020. "Viewpoint: Regulating meat consumption to improve health, the environment and animal welfare," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    12. Craig Gallet, 2004. "The efficacy of state-level antismoking laws: Demand and supply considerations," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 28(3), pages 404-412, September.
    13. Cassandro Mendes & Olugbenga Adesida, 2013. "Income inequality and economic development: evidence from sub-Saharan African countries," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 33(2), pages 1565-1574.
    14. János Pénzes & Zoltán Bujdosó & Lóránt Dávid & Zsolt Radics & Gábor Kozma, 2014. "Differing development paths of spatial income inequalities after the political transition — by the example of Hungary and its regions," Economy of region, Centre for Economic Security, Institute of Economics of Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences, vol. 1(1), pages 73-84.
    15. Narain Sinha, 2005. "Growth, Inequality and Structural Adjustment: An Empirical Interpretation of the S-Curve for the Indian Economy," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Raghbendra Jha (ed.), Economic Growth, Economic Performance and Welfare in South Asia, chapter 18, pages 369-383, Palgrave Macmillan.
    16. Sayed Adham, 2020. "Is there a Kuznets Curve in the Arab Region? An Empirical Investigation," Review of Middle East Economics and Finance, De Gruyter, vol. 16(2), pages 1-17, August.
    17. Alfonso Díez‐Minguela & Rafael González‐Val & Julio Martinez‐Galarraga & M. Teresa Sanchis & Daniel A. Tirado, 2020. "The long‐term relationship between economic development and regional inequality: South‐West Europe, 1860–2010," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 99(3), pages 479-508, June.
    18. Blanco, Juan A., 2007. "The representation of allelopathy in ecosystem-level forest models," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 209(2), pages 65-77.
    19. Whytcross, David, 2024. "How tobacco excise increases affect smoking behaviours in Australia," Warwick-Monash Economics Student Papers 67, Warwick Monash Economics Student Papers.
    20. Barra, Cristian & Zotti, Roberto, 2016. "Investigating the impact of national income on environmental pollution. International evidence," MPRA Paper 74149, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. K. Herve DAKPO & Pascale COMBES MOTEL & Johanna CHOUMERT, 2012. "The environmental Kuznets curve for deforestation: a threatened theory? A meta-analysis," Working Papers 201216, CERDI.
    22. Robert J. Sonora, 2022. "A panel analysis of income inequality and energy use," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(1), pages 83-97, January.
    23. Gabriela Woźniak & Monika Malicka & Jacek Kasztowski & Łukasz Radosz & Joanna Czarnecka & Jaco Vangronsveld & Dariusz Prostański, 2022. "How Important Are the Relations between Vegetation Diversity and Bacterial Functional Diversity for the Functioning of Novel Ecosystems?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-16, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0280945. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.