Passages muraux et escaliers : premières expériences dans l'architecture du XIe s.

Abstract

Apart from wall passages which have been studied by J. Bony and P. Héliot, the problem of circulation in the upper parts of Romanesque churches has received little attention. It seems that a crucial stage in this field came about in the middle of the XIth century with the apparition and rapid generalisation of stairs giving access uniquely to roof spaces. These stairways posed new problems for architects. Were they to be hidden in the mass of the masonry or shown off in turrets which underlined the massing of the different parts of the building ? Leaving aside a few early and exceptional experiments (Saint-Bénigne de Dijon), it was only in the last third of the XIth century that, notably in Normandy but occasionally elsewhere (Cluny), stairs were fînally linked together by real circulatory networks. The vaulting of the entire churches, however, set certain limits to these experiments, often inspired by Roman architecture, before the development of more formal outer skin design in wall thickening processes during the XIIth century.