Historical Sketch of the Cathedral of Strasburg — Background and Themes

A Site of Successive Worship

The sketch begins by asserting that the cathedral occupies a spot “devoted to worship from the remotest times.” It describes a hill sloping westward into a cavity, later filled, where Celts built huts and a druidical dolmen stood. After the Roman conquest, a temple to Hercules and Mars replaced the sacred wood. The author finds support for these traditions in pagan statues discovered near the cathedral, including a brass Hercules called Krutzmann taken down in 1525, and a stone Hercules still visible in a niche of the north tower.

This layering of pagan and Christian on one site gives the sketch a distinctive temporal depth. The author does not treat the cathedral as a single creation but as a palimpsest, where each era left its mark. The description of the interior front notes a “beautiful sculptured round-window” above the principal porch, and between it and the grand rose-window a glass gallery—elements that belong to different building campaigns.

Sculpture as Argument

The southern porch is described in terms of its sculptural program. Two female figures dominate: one holding a communion cup and cross, “the symbol of the church that vanquished the synagogue”; the other blindfolded, leaning on a broken spear, with the laws of the twelve tables dropping from her hand. This allegorical pairing is a theological argument in stone, and the sketch presents it without commentary, letting the iconography speak.

On the parvis before this porch stand statues of Sabina of Steinbach and Erwin of Steinbach, both by the chisel of Mr. Grass. The author notes that the northern portion of the cross-aisle “has more generally preserved the byzantine manner,” but that an intermixture with gothic style “denounces latter renovations.” The ancient porch is masked by a fore-front built in 1494, which the sketch judges harshly: “though handsome in its ensemble, it is wanting in that noble simplicity and purity of taste that distinguishes the other parts.”

Light and Glass: The Interior Order

The interior is “mysteriously lighted by magnificent painted windows.” The nave is supported on each side by seven large pillars of round agglomerated columns; the two first, more gigantic, support the towers. The total elevation of the upper arch exceeds 31 metres. Above the arches runs a fine gothic gallery serving as a basis for large windows.

The painted windows are catalogued with care. The oldest known artist is master John of Kirchheim, whose drawings were installed in 1348. Later names include John Markgraf, James Vischer, and the brothers Link. In the late eighteenth century John Daniel Danegger painted some windows, but these were later removed for mediocrity. The upper galleries show the seventy-four ancestors of Jesus Christ; higher up are saints and martyrs. In the right aisle, over the vestry, is the gigantic figure of Saint Christopher. On the south side, six windows each have sixteen divisions: the first four contain scenes from the Bible, the last two scenes from the Golden Legend.

Repairs, Removals, and the 1870 Fire

The sketch is attentive to later interventions. Until 1772 the lower part of the lateral fronts was disfigured by “paltry decayed houses”; that year they were pulled down and replaced by porticos “not wanting in elegance.” Shops and stalls that obstructed access to the nave also disappeared. The porches were repaired with “a great amount of good taste.”

More dramatically, the octangular dome over the chancel, of byzantine origin, was destroyed by the fire of 1870. In its place a “handsome pyramid” was erected in 1878 after plans by Mr. Klotz, architect of the Cathedral. The text notes that the dome had been “renewed in several parts” before the fire. This attention to destruction and rebuilding gives the sketch a sense of ongoing vulnerability—the cathedral is not a fixed monument but one repeatedly damaged and remade.

The Historical Sketch is best read as a guided walk, moving from the site’s pre-Christian origins through the fabric of the building itself. Its judgments are concrete and often critical: the porch of St. Laurence is overloaded, Danegger’s windows mediocre. The text ends abruptly—the transcriber notes no evidence of missing pages—but the fragmentary quality suits a work that treats its subject as a collection of layers, each incomplete. Readers interested in the cathedral’s physical history will find a wealth of specific detail, though they should supplement this sketch with more recent scholarship.

That rainy afternoon, I kept returning to the cathedral's silent stone—how each carved face held a century’s private weight. Later, idly, I found myself reading Memoirs of Madame la Marquise de Montespan — Volume 3 — A Closer Reading, and it struck me: both are archives of whispered ambitions, stone and ink keeping their secrets differently.