Cantoned pillar

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Round pillars with cantons

A cantoned pillar is a pillar whose round, polygonal or rectangular core is filled with (round or angular) templates, mostly half or three-quarter columns . In a narrower sense, the term describes a pillar with a round or polygonal core and four templates. The term is derived from French heraldry , in which "cantonné" is a figure surrounded by four minor figures in the quarters of the escutcheon.

“Cantoned pillar” (after Jantzen) in the Cathedral of Chartres . Here as a round pillar core with polygonal services . These pillars alternate in Chartres with polygonal cores, which in turn are occupied by round services.

Like many terms in architectural history , the term is not used uniformly: In connection with his investigations into the Gothic cathedrals, the art historian Hans Jantzen describes those pillars that are surrounded by (four) services as "cantoned" . Cantonal pillars in its definition first appeared in Chartres Cathedral (construction began in 1194). They replace the patternless round pillars that were widespread in the early Gothic period and make it possible to take up the lines of the arcade and vaulted arches on the pillar. In this context, Jantzen regards earlier solutions in the aisle of Notre Dame de Paris and in the cathedral of Laon as preliminary stages of the early Gothic. The form found in Chartres was taken up in the cathedral of Reims (begun in 1211) and the cathedral of Amiens (from 1220). In this sense, in German art history, “cantoned pillar” only refers to the Chartres type pillar and its Europe-wide successor. Other authors consider the term cantoned pillar to be “incorrect” in relation to “Gothic articulated pillar” and use the term Gothic articulated pillar to make it clear that the Chartres pillar is not fundamentally new, but is in the tradition of similar articulated pillars. Over time, the cantoned pillar will mainly be replaced by the bundle pillar .

References and footnotes

  1. ↑ Viollet-le-Duc : Dictionnaire raisonné de l'architecture française du XIe au XVIe siècle , Paris 1854–1868. Vol. II, p. 259, derives the meaning from heraldry, cf. on the heraldic term http://www.blason-armoiries.org/heraldique/c/cantonne.htm . In this sense, one can speak of a “tour cantonnée de quatre tourelles” in French, a “tower cantoned by four small turrets”. The derivation of the German word "Kante" as in Wasmuths Lexikon der Baukunst , Berlin, 1929-1932 (4 volumes), Lemma Kantoniert , where it is said that a pillar is cantoned with the edges (corners) apparently bevelled and with half - or three-quarter columns are occupied is wrong, especially since a round pillar (Chartres) has no corners
  2. ↑ cf. Hans Jantzen: Art of the Gothic. Classical cathedrals of France Chartres, Reims, Amiens , section 1.1 The nave , Rowohlt, 1957/1968, p. 24 ff.
  3. ^ So Hans Koepf , Günther Binding : Picture Dictionary of Architecture (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 194). 4th, revised edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-520-19404-X , Lemma Kantoniert + articulated pillar . Otherwise, their general definition coincides with Wasmuth's. In detail, Günther Binding: The Gothic column pillar . In: Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch 59, 1998, pp. 29-58. Online: binding.ws/GuentherBinding/gliederpfeiler.pdf