The mediæval churches of western Europe nearly all claim a pre-Christian origin. It is charming to the mind of a certain type of antiquary to discover the origin of a Christian cathedral in the wreck of a Roman temple. For Westminster Abbey and for St. Paul’s Roman foundations have, with more or less accuracy, been described. In the case of Notre Dame it is certain that the remains of an altar of Jupiter were discovered in 1711, which would seem to indicate that a pagan temple once stood on or near the site in the Gaulish city of Lutetia Parisiorum. In point of fact, it is a matter of no small difficulty to make out clearly the origin of Notre Dame, or to describe with certainty the ecclesiastical buildings which in the dim past occupied its site. A lady writer who has discussed the church with much intelligence writes on this matter as follows:[1]
[1] The Churches of Paris, by S. Sophia Beale: London, W. H. Allen and Co., 1893.
“The origin of Notre Dame is enveloped in mystery. Whether its first bishop, St. Denis, or Dionysius, was the Areopagite converted by St. Paul’s preaching at Athens, and sent by St. Clement to preach the Gospel to the Parisians, or whether he was another personage of the same name who was sent into Gaul in the third century and martyred during the persecutions under Decius, it is impossible to say, as there is no evidence of any value. Certain it is, however, that the first bishop of Paris bore the name of Denis, and that he suffered martyrdom, with his two companions Rusticus and Eleutherius, on the summit of the hill now called Montmartre. Tradition went so far as to point out the spot where they first gathered their followers together—the crypt of Notre Dame des Champs; also the prison where our Lord appeared to them and strengthened them with His Holy Body and Blood at St. Denis de la Chartre; the place, at St. Denis du Pas, where they suffered their first tortures; and lastly, Montmartre, where they were beheaded. But, with the exception of the latter, all these holy spots have disappeared. So, too, have the crosses which marked the route taken by the Saint, when he carried his head to the place chosen for his burial, at St. Denis. An ancient church covered the remains of the three saints until the present splendid building was erected, in the reign of Dagobert I. Under the Roman dominion, Paris was comprised in the fourth Lyonnaise division, of which Sens was the metropolis. Hence the bishops of Paris acknowledged the Archbishop of Sens as their primate until 1622, when, at the request of Louis XIII., Pope Gregory XV. raised Paris to the see of an archbishopric. The succession has consisted of one hundred and nine bishops and fifteen archbishops, eight of whom have been raised to the dignity of Cardinal. Besides St. Denis six have been venerated as Saints: Marcel, in the fifth century; Germain, in the sixth century; Ceran, Landry, and Agilbert in the seventh, and Hugues in the eighth century.”
We must leave this ancient and hazy story of saints and martyrs, and return to the thorny question of the origin of the cathedral. From the brief account of Notre Dame by Mr. A. J. C. Hare in his entertaining volume on Paris, we glean that about the year 375 a church, dedicated to St. Stephen (St. Etienne), was built on the islet under Prudentius, eighth bishop of Paris. “In 528,” says Mr. Hare, “through the gratitude of Childebert—‘le nouveau Melchisedech’—for his recovery from a sickness by St. Germain, another far more rich and beautiful edifice (dedicated to Sainte Marie—) arose by the side of the first church, and was destined to become ecclesia parisiaca, the cathedral of Paris. Childebert endowed it with three estates—at Chelles-en-Brie, at La Celle near Monterau, and at La Celle near Fréjus—which last supplied the oil for its sacred ordinances. The new church had not long been finished when La Cité, in which the monks of S. Germain had taken refuge with their treasures, was besieged by the Normans; but it was successfully defended by Bishop Gozlin, who died during the siege. It is believed that the substructions of this church were found during recent excavations in the Parvis Notre Dame,[2] and architectural fragments then discovered are now preserved at the Palais des Thermes.” It may be taken for granted that Childebert’s church took the form of a Roman basilica, and it is probable that Roman materials were used in its construction. In 1847 further Roman remains were discovered on the site which doubtless formed part of Childebert’s building. Some of them are preserved at the Hôtel-Cluny.
[2] The space to the west of the church was called Parvis paradisus, the earthly paradise leading by the celestial Jerusalem.
I am, however, inclined to agree with M. de Guilhermy and M. Viollet-le-Duc,[3] that the story of the cathedral previous to the episcopacy of Bishop Maurice de Sully (1160–96) is, if not absolutely fictitious, at least merely conjectural.
[3] See Description de Notre-Dame, Cathédrale de Paris: Paris, 1856. The main points of Viollet-le-Duc’s inventory of the cathedral will be found in Queyron’s Histoire et Description de l’Eglise de Notre Dame, Paris: E. Plon, Nourrit et Cie.
This prelate—generally counted as the sixty-second occupant of the see—seems at first to have united the adjacent churches of St. Stephen and Ste Marie on the Ile de la Cité, and then (without immediately and totally destroying them) to have commenced a new one on the same site, of which Pope Alexander III. laid the foundation-stone in 1163. Rapid progress must have been made with the work, for it is certain that in 1185 Heraclitus, patriarch of Jerusalem, officiated at the altar, in front of which, in the year following, Geoffrey, Count of Brittany, son of Henry II. of England, was buried. Maurice de Sully provided for the continuation of the work after his death, which took place in 1196. By his will he left five thousand livres in order that the choir might be roofed with lead. At this time, according to Viollet-le-Duc, considerable progress must have been made with the nave. Maurice de Sully was succeeded by Eudes de Sully (1197–1208), on whose death the see was occupied, until 1219, by Pierre de Nemours. Towards 1223 the west front was completed to the base of the great gallery, and by 1235 the towers were left much as we see them to-day. The spires, which it is generally admitted they were intended to carry, were never added.
Between the years 1235 and 1240, a fire seems to have broken out at Notre Dame. On this subject history is silent, but that it did serious damage is maintained by Viollet-le-Duc on what appear to be sufficient grounds. According to him, repair was made in haste, so that rose windows, flying buttresses and other structural details were ruthlessly sacrificed. The west front seems to have escaped mutilation. Up to 1245 the cathedral, vast as was its area, possessed either no chapels at all, or chapels of inconsiderable dimensions. In that year, however, the addition of new chapels was proceeded with. It would appear that, shortly after, the plainness of the transept fronts in comparison with the splendidly decorated west façade was acutely felt. In 1257, Jean de Chelles was engaged on reconstructing the southern doorway. At this time St. Louis was King of France, and Renaud de Corbeil bishop of Paris. The northern door and the chapels next the transepts on either side were altered immediately after the southern entrance. In 1351, Jean Ravy and Jean de Bouteiller were engaged about the cathedral as sculptors.