John James

First part of 5-part history of the development of Gothic in the churches of the Paris Basin, 1120-1250. The Creation of Gothic Architecture 2 volume set is a five-part illustrated thesaurus of the Early Gothic churches in the limestone region of northern France known as the Paris Basin. It focuses on the transformation from romanesque to gothic architecture during the years between 1120 and 1250, and when complete it will provide a comprehensive pictorial history of the 1,420 churches of the Paris Basin. Most of these churches, which represent a vital step in the evolution of western European architecture, are barely known outside the region, and have been little recorded. The completed project will: provide a photographic description of all the more significant churches; analyse stylistic changes to foliate capitals and vault-erection techniques; establish a foundation for dating the contruction phases of the churches; and, using this chronology, will identify the time and place for each of the creative ideas, inventions and innovations that produced the gothic style, follow their evolution from place to place, and identify the major creators. Dr JOHN JAMES is a world authority on medieval architecture, author of over sixty books and articles.

"After Francis Amunategui": The appearance of a hot sausage with its salad of potatoes in oil can leave nobody indifferent ...it is pure, it precludes all sentimentality, it is the Truth.

James' analysis of Chartres is likely to be the best and most detailed we shall have.' JOURNAL OF ARCHITECTURAL HISTORIANS The great cathedral of Chartres is the most impressive and exciting building surviving from themiddle ages, andis preserved almost intact. Yet we know nothing of the men who created it. John James, in this masterpiece of detection, shows how he came to identify the master masons from the stones themselves. His meticulous `reading' of the cathedral has revealed much about those men: how they solved problems of engineering and design, how they raised two-ton stones forty metres into the air, and how one mason controlled over 300 men in this gigantic workshop. JOHN JAMES is an Australian architect. His first visit to Chartres, in 1969, led to a continuing passion for the early Gothic buildings of northern France, and he has been `reading their stones' ever since.