Fol. 15r Codicology 15th leaf in the portfolio; 1st leaf in quire 3; single leaf; 29th surface in the portfolio. Size 240 mm. (9.41 in.) x 156 mm. (6.12 in.) Paginations Mancel = p; C-18 = 15. Concordance Lassus and Willis = XXVIII; Omont and Bouvet = XXIX; Hahnloser and Erlande-Brandenburg et alia = 29; Bucher = V29; Chanfón = 15r; Bowie = 48. Condition This leaf is stiff, with a 14 mm. (0.55 in.) tear in the gutter by the upper plan and is attached to a very thin modern vellum (paper?) tab. This is the hair side of the parchment.

Drawing 1

Subject
Chevet Plan devised by Villard de Honnecourt and Pierre de Corbie

Size
132 mm. (5.15 in.) x 135 mm. (5.27 in.)

Technique
Drawn with brown ink without evidence of preliminary graphite drawing. There is a pinprick in the center of the choir, indicating that Villard used a compass to make this design. There is erasure and redrawing of the vaulting ribs in the radiating chapel, especially visible in a photograph taken under ultraviolet light (Pl. 23), and a graphite (?) smear over the left side of the plan. The vaulting ribs were drawn freehand, without using a straightedge.

Attribution
Villard

Inscription
Note: There are two inscriptions concerning this drawing. The earlier of the two is in Picard by Villard or his scribe and is the second of the two lines found at the bottom of the leaf. The later of the two is a Latin paraphrase by Hand III of the first. It is found in the straight bays of the plan.

Villard Inscription
Transcription
Deseure est une glize a double charole. k[e] vilars dehonecort trova et pie / res de corbie

Literal Translation
Above is a church with double ambulatory that Villard de Honnecourt imagined, and Pierre de Corbie.

Free Translation
Above is a double-ambulatory church devised by Villard de Honnecourt and Pierre de Corbie.
Hand III Inscription
Transcription
istud bresbiterium in / venerunt ulardus de hu / necort et petrus de corbeia / inter se disputando

Literal Translation
This presbytery Villard de Honnecourt and Pierre de Corbie devised, discussing it between themselves.

Free Translation
Villard de Honnecourt and Pierre de Corbie devised this chevet through discussion.

Commentary
Much attention has been given to the expression inter se disputanto, especially by Panofsky, who related it to scholasticism. This attempt to reconcile opposites, circular and square chapels, was for Panofsky scholastic thinking in architecture. All too many authors misattribute the text as well as the plan to Villard, thereby imputing to him an interest in scholasticism demonstrable neither in his texts nor in his drawings. Hand III was showing off by writing in Latin and since he misidentified the second plan, he cannot be trusted to have understood what Villard and Pierre were about.

Nothing whatsoever is known of Pierre de Corbie—opening the way to much speculation, for example, that he may have been Petrus Petri, architect of Toledo. In fact, there is no proof that Pierre de Corbie was an architect/mason. The way Villard or his scribe wrote this inscription and crowded in Pierre de Corbie’s name leaves open the possibility that his name was added as an afterthought.

Chevets with double ambulatories were not common in Villard’s time, and certainly not in his geographic area. Still, Bony made an interesting comparison of this chevet design with that of Coutances as two schemes that “sought maximum extension on the ground.” He also noted that Villard and Pierre’s effort seems academically theoretical and that it might be “imagined as an amplified version of the plan of Vaucelles” (fol. 17r).

What Villard and Pierre were attempting to do was to devise a plan that incorporated alternating radiating chapels, five square and four semicircular, and to vault the semicircular chapels with the outer ambulatory. The latter was done in Abbot Suger’s chevet at Saint-Denis in the 1140s and even more smoothly in a single ambulatory at Soissons in the early 1190s, a site Villard visited. In Romanesque buildings in the region square and rounded chapels are found: St. Lucien at Beauvais, begun ca. 1090, and Notre-Dame du Mont, ca. 1160 near Soissons.

In Villard and Pierre’s scheme the chapels are alternately of different sizes, a scheme seen in the chevet at Chartres. Branner found their solution an unhappy one, referring to the plan as “somewhat monstrous.” Willis noted that the alternating vaulting patterns in the outer ambulatory were “inharmonious.” Bucher was more blunt, calling the sizes of the square chapels “uncouth.” The two ambulatories probably would have been vaulted at the same height, as at Paris, had the plan been executed. Villard drew all supports as columns of similar diameter.

Drawing 2

Subject
Plan of the Chevet of the Cathedral of St. Etienne, Meaux

Size
121 mm. (4.72 in.) x 144 mm. (5.67 in.)

Technique
Drawn as the plan above. There is a pinprick indentation but not a puncture in the center of the hemicycle, indicating the use of a compass. There is also a pinprick in the northern chapel but not in the other two. A trace of graphite preliminary drawing can be seen in the third rib respond from the west in the north radiating chapel. Several of the ribs were drawn with a nearly dry quill.

Attribution
Villard

Inscription
Note: There are two inscriptions concerning this drawing. The earlier of the two is in Picard by Villard or his scribe and is the upper of the two lines found at the bottom of the leaf. The later of the two is a Latin paraphrase by Hand III of the first found in the hemicycle and straight bay of the plan.

Villard Inscription Transcription
vesci les ligement de le glize de miax de saint estienne.

Literal Translation
See here the plan of the church of Saint Etienne at Meaux.

Free Translation
Here is the plan of the church of St. Etienne at Meaux.

Hand III Inscription Transcription
istud est presbiterium / Sancti pharaonis in / miaus

Literal Translation
This is the presbytery of Saint Faron in Meaux

.
Free Translation
This is the chevet of Saint Faron in Meaux.

Commentary
Hand III misidentified the plan as that of the now-destroyed church St. Faron at Meaux rather than that of St. Etienne, the cathedral church, despite the fact that the correct dedicatory name is given in Villard’s text. This seemingly proves that Hand III did not have access to Villard, did not know the plan of the cathedral, and was careless. It has been inaccurately reported that Villard claimed credit for the Meaux chevet.

Today Meaux has five radiating chapels but originally had three isolated chapels, as Villard’s drawing shows. Gautier de Varinfroy rebuilt the three chapels in the Rayonnant style in the 1250s. Beginning in 1317 a chapel was built between each of Gautier’s chapels, thus Villard’s plan is a valuable archaeological document whose general configuration confirms the original chevet arrangement at Meaux. Its details are not accurate. In Kurmann’s words, “… the fragrant inaccuracy of all the details proves in a most evident way that the plan [of Villard] is not an exact layout, but a simple sketch.” Still, Villard observed correctly the polygonal plan of the chapels at the level of the windows and this is the only plan in the portfolio in which he has indicated the windows.

There is a generic relationship between these two plans, as if the plan of Meaux was the starting point for the “ideal” plan above. It is not clear, in examining the leaf, which was drawn first, but the relative spacing of the two suggests that the Meaux plan came first, crowded as it is to the bottom of the leaf in anticipation of the upper plan.