• La façade occidentale de la cathédrale vue de face, avec la foule l'observant depuis son parvis
  • La façade occidentale de la cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris, vue Sud-Ouest
  • Le côté Est des deux tours vues depuis le toit de la cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris
Close

The Western Facade

The west facade results from innovative architecture for its time. Its style offers a regular rhythm of horizontal and vertical lines. Large portals welcome the faithful, while the square towers house the bells.

Construction of the west facade began in 1200 under the episcopate of Eudes de Sully. It continued with Bishop Guillaume d'Auvergne, advisor and confessor to Saint Louis, and was completed with the north tower in 1240 and the south tower in 1250. Several architects succeeded in its realization. Its construction received great attention as it served multiple functions: entrance for the faithful, entry of west light, and housing and sound diffusion of the bells in the towers.
La façade occidentale de la cathédrale vue de face, avec la foule l'observant depuis son parvis View

A Visual Harmony

The strength of this west facade lies in the interplay of vertical lines (four buttresses and two towers) and horizontal lines (portals, gallery of kings, bays, columns). Its imposing dimensions result from a technological feat for its time: 41 meters in width, 69 meters in height to the top of the towers.

The harmonious simplicity of its proportions fascinates. The architect Le Corbusier spoke in the 20th century of a pure creation of the spirit governed by the square and the circle, hence its geometric purity. The square symbolizes the rational world, limited space, while the circle symbolizes the spiritual state, the unlimited, the divine.

The Portals

Three portals make up the lower part of the west facade. The central portal, called the Portal of the Last Judgment, is larger than the Portal of Saint Anne (south, right) and the Portal of the Virgin (north, left). These portals are adorned with many biblical figures. They allow the faithful who cannot read the Bible to understand the gospel and the history of Christians through images.

On the buttresses, niches house four statues redone by Viollet-le-Duc’s workshop in the 19th century. From left to right, probably Saint Stephen and Saint Denis, and on either side of the central portal, the allegories of the Church and the Synagogue.

The Gallery of Kings

Below the balustrade, a horizontal band presents the gallery of kings. At twenty meters from the ground, it forms a series of twenty-eight figures illustrating the twenty-eight generations of the kings of Judea, preceding Christ. During the Revolution, wrongly associated with the sovereigns of the kingdom of France, the statues were destroyed or mutilated. During the 19th-century restorations, the workshops of Adolphe-Victor and Geoffroy-Dechaume created the statues still visible today. In 1860, the sculptor Chenillon left inscriptions on some statues. Thus, Pierre Émile Queyron, first inspector of Notre-Dame, appears under the features of Ahab, Viollet-le-Duc under those of Ela, and Antoine Lassus under the features of Amaziah. Twenty-one original heads were found in 1977 during construction work on Rue de la Chaussée d’Antin (Paris 9th). They are displayed at the National Museum of the Middle Ages in Paris (Cluny Museum). They retain traces of polychromy, proving that some elements of the 13th-century cathedral were painted.

The Gallery of the Virgin

The gallery of kings is surmounted by a small terrace bordered by an openwork balustrade that forms the gallery of the Virgin. At the center of the facade, a rose window 9.60 meters in diameter was executed around 1225. Two angels, with candlesticks symbolizing sin and redemption, flank a central statue of the Virgin. This ensemble was commissioned by Viollet-le-Duc to replace damaged statues and was realized in 1854 by Geoffroy-Dechaume. Viollet-le-Duc placed statues of Adam and Eve (sculpted by Jean-Louis Chenillon) on either side of the rose window. Some experts believe that the statues of Adam and Eve would be better placed in the niches of the transept on the south facade.

The Towers

The two square towers measure 69 meters in height. One reaches their summit via 422 steps. The four faces are pierced with two high bays with voussoirs adorned with beadings and leafy crockets. They are covered with a lead terrace bordered by an openwork balustrade. The south tower was built around 1220-1240, and the north tower between 1235 and 1250. The towers offer an exceptional view of the center of Paris with distant perspectives. Their height once allowed the faithful and pilgrims to locate themselves from afar, as Paris is situated in a basin. Spires were considered in the 13th century but were never built. The towers house the bronze bells and the Emmanuel bourdon.

Imprimer