Toul Cathedral: A Gothic Cathedral in France
Site at a Glance
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- 4.6
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- Medium
- Country
- France
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern
- Civilizations
- French, Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Cathedral
On this page23 sections
History
Toul Cathedral is a Roman Catholic cathedral dedicated to Saint Stephen and the Virgin Mary in Toul, France. The present Gothic building was begun around 1210, probably before 1220, and its construction continued in stages until 1497. Formerly the seat of the Diocese of Toul, it is now associated with the Diocese of Nancy-Toul, following the transfer of the diocesan seat to Nancy in 1790 and the reorganization of the diocese in 1824.
Early Christian and Romanesque origins
The cathedral is traditionally regarded as the sixth cathedral built at Toul. It probably occupies the site of a Roman temple, which may have been destroyed during the incursions of the Huns. A Christian cathedral dedicated to Saint Stephen and the Virgin Mary was built in the second half of the fifth century as part of an episcopal complex containing three churches. The third church served as a baptistery dedicated to Saint John the Baptist.
Between 963 and 967, Bishop Gérard of Toul began a Romanesque cathedral by bringing the earlier basilicas together into one building. Further rebuilding during the eleventh and twelfth centuries probably created a Rhenish-Romanesque arrangement, an architectural plan associated with the Rhineland and characterized by a substantial eastern end flanked by towers.
The Gothic rebuilding
The Gothic cathedral is traditionally assigned a foundation date of 1210, although construction probably began before 1220. The eastern end, or chevet, was started between 1207 and 1221, during or shortly before the episcopate of Bishop Eudes II of Sorcy, and the choir was completed around 1235. The new structure gradually replaced the Romanesque cathedral over more than three centuries.
The choir and transept were built during the thirteenth century. The transept and the final bay of the nave were constructed between about 1275 and 1297, after which a new canons’ choir was established at the centre of the crossing. The remaining five nave bays were built between 1331 and 1400 as the Romanesque nave was progressively demolished. A Gothic cloister was also begun around 1240 and completed before the end of the thirteenth century. Its chapter house was installed in the north gallery during the fourteenth century.
Work stopped entirely between 1400 and 1460 during the war between the dukes of Burgundy and Lorraine. Appeals by the cathedral chapter to Pope Sixtus IV and King Louis XI brought donations of 1,000 and 1,500 livres, allowing construction to resume. Jacquemin de Lenoncourt undertook part of the western facade and the first nave bay, while the chapter commissioned Tristan de Hattonchâtel to design the facade. The towers were completed with fleur-de-lis crowns in 1496. The western portal was finished the same year, and the first bells rang in the north tower in 1497, completing the principal building campaign.
Renaissance and early modern changes
Renaissance work altered several parts of the medieval cathedral. The “Golden Ball” dome was erected over the crossing, and two belfries were added above the chevet towers around 1530. Bishop Hector d’Ailly commissioned the Bishops’ Chapel before 1533, while a Renaissance bell tower was built between the western facade towers in 1534. Its bell dates from 1536. The upper part of the sacristy furniture was installed in 1537 under Bishop Antoine Pélegrin, and cantor Jean Forget commissioned the All Saints’ Chapel before 1549.
The upper storey of the south chevet tower collapsed in 1561. The upper storey of the north tower was later demolished for safety, and matching priest’s-cap roofs were added to the two towers. Between 1625 and 1725, the apse received marble and paintings depicting Saint Stephen, Saint John the Baptist, Saint Gérard of Toul, several bishops of Toul, the Fathers of the Church, Saint Joseph, Saint Ursula, Saint Leo IX, Saint Apronia, and the Apostles Peter and Paul. The panels had originally served as removable doors for cabinets containing the relics of the corresponding saints.
The eighteenth century brought further lateral chapels and an organ gallery, built in 1750. An organ had existed at the cathedral since at least the fourteenth century. The earlier instrument was replaced by a large organ commissioned from Nicolas Dupont in 1751 and received on 14 July 1755.
Diocesan change and revolutionary damage
The annexation of the Bishopric of Toul to the Kingdom of France was confirmed in 1648 after the Treaty of Westphalia, the settlement that ended the Thirty Years’ War and reshaped political control in central Europe. In 1776, the diocese was divided to create the bishoprics of Nancy and Saint-Dié. The Bishopric of Toul was suppressed in 1790 in favor of Nancy, and the cathedral later became part of the Diocese of Nancy-Toul in 1824.
In January 1794, revolutionary authorities ordered the removal of statues from the western facade, the rood screen, the choir stalls, and other ornaments. Sculptures in the cloister were also removed. Some facade sculptures survived and are displayed in the Toul Museum.
Restoration, war, and reconstruction
Toul Cathedral was listed as a French historic monument in 1840, and the cloister received separate protection in 1889. The thirteenth-century apse glazing was removed in 1836 during the reconfiguration of the apsidioles. Émile Boeswillwald began a major restoration in 1874 and was later succeeded by his son Paul Boeswillwald. New apse windows were installed between 1874 and 1876.
Prussian shelling damaged the western facade and its early sixteenth-century great rose window in 1870, while the Renaissance choir windows were destroyed. On 20 June 1940, wartime bombardment set fire to the roof and destroyed the eighteenth-century organ. The fire also caused the loss of the south-west tower and devastated the southern part of the town.
A temporary roof was installed after the fire, but it remained for more than forty years while the cathedral was exposed to the weather. The building was closed for safety in 1978 after the temporary roofing deteriorated. Postwar restoration under Dominique Bortoluzzi included the south tower, the rose window, and the organ gallery. From 1981, the roofs were rebuilt to their pre-1940 geometry with slate laid over a high metal frame. Exterior restoration, apart from the western facade, ended in 1995.
Later work restored the western facade and towers in 2003, the main nave and vault polychromy in 2004 and 2005, the choir and transept polychromy between 2006 and 2008, and the cloister roofs between 2009 and 2010. The lateral roofs were restored in 2020. Restoration of the lateral vaults remains pending, and the Bishops’ Chapel is still awaiting restoration and reopening. The cathedral marked its eight-hundredth anniversary in 2021, when a new treasury room was inaugurated as part of the associated cultural programme.
The organ destroyed in 1940 was replaced by a neo-Classical instrument built by Curt Schwenkedel and inaugurated by Gaston Litaize on 23 June 1963. It was modernized and restored by the organ builder Kœnig, then inaugurated and blessed on 12 June 2016.
Regional Gothic influence
Toul Cathedral is described as the first Gothic building project begun in the lands of the Holy Roman Empire, the medieval multi-state political entity that continued until 1806. Its thirteenth-century design is associated with a proposed “Toul school,” a regional architectural influence linked to buildings in Lorraine, Champagne, and the Empire, including churches and collegiate foundations at Trier, Cologne, Wimpfen-im-Tal, Metz, and Épinal.
Remains
Toul Cathedral is a Gothic Latin-cross church built chiefly of Euville stone. It has three aisles, a transept, a choir ending in an apse surrounded by chapels, and a large cloister. The building is approximately 100 metres long. Its interior measures about 89.8 to 89.9 metres from the choir to the western facade, while the facade is about 37 metres wide and the transept approximately 56 metres across. The facade towers rise about 62 to 65 metres. Projected Gothic spires would have reached roughly 90 metres but were never built.
Choir, chevet, and transept
Eastern end
The seven-bay choir is flanked by two chevet towers. Their lower levels open as chapels and their upper levels contain galleries, giving the eastern end the Rhenish-Romanesque form known as a Lorraine chevet. The arrangement, in which a substantial choir or apse is framed by towers, is regarded as an archetype of the regional type. The choir was conceived over a crypt, a lower chamber beneath the church, and its design was influenced by Verdun Cathedral.
Transept
The transept forms a large, exceptionally luminous space built as a single volume without columns or side aisles. It measures about 48 metres in length and 16.5 metres in width, with an original vault height of approximately 32 metres. Large Gothic openings rise about 22 metres through the transept walls. Glazed windows are surmounted by rose windows, and the south transept contains an opening described as France’s largest single Gothic opening, measuring about 28 metres high and 216 square metres in area.
Western facade and nave chapels
Western facade
The western facade is a major example of Flamboyant Gothic, the late Gothic style known for flowing tracery and elaborate decoration. Its overall arrangement follows a French or Reims-inspired scheme with three portals whose tympana are glazed. The decoration of the towers probably draws on Saint-Martin of Pont-à-Mousson, while the facade influenced the facade of Saint-Nicolas-de-Port and the portals of Notre-Dame-de-l’Épine. The nave vaults rise about 29 to 30 metres, compared with an original height of approximately 32 metres before the floor was raised. The side aisles are about 16.77 metres high.
Bishops’ Chapel
The Renaissance Bishops’ Chapel occupies the north side of the nave. Its unusual flat coffered vault is supported by simple segmental arches and spans approximately eight metres without an independently visible supporting structure. The chapel has remained closed since the Second World War pending restoration.
All Saints’ Chapel
The Renaissance All Saints’ Chapel occupies the south side of the nave. It has a dome topped by a lantern and contains trompe-l’oeil perspective, an artistic technique that creates the illusion of three-dimensional space on a flat surface, associated with Jean Pèlerin, known as “Le Viator.” The chapel later became the burial chapel of Jean Forget, a cathedral chaplain and cantor.
Glazing, sculpture, and furnishings
Windows
The choir contains thirteenth-century windows commissioned by Bishop Roger de Mercy in 1235. Their subjects include biblical scenes and episodes from the lives of saints. They were moved to the apsidioles during the nineteenth century. Casimir de Balthasar de Gachéo created the nineteenth-century choir glazing for three double-lancet windows about 26 metres high. The central window presents fourteen scenes from the life of Christ, the left window shows scenes from the Old Testament, and the right window depicts episodes in the history of the Church.
Balthasar de Gachéo’s south-transept window, installed in 1863, shows the discovery of Saint Stephen’s relics in its upper register. Its lower register represents four notable bishops of Toul, Saint Mansuy, Saint Epvre, Saint Gérard, and Saint Leo IX, together with associated scenes. The north-transept window dates from 1503 and is signed “I. V.”, probably for Jean le Verrier. It represents the Coronation of the Virgin, reflecting the cathedral’s dedication to both the Virgin Mary and Saint Stephen. The nave clerestory contains fifteenth-century grisaille glazing, a form of predominantly monochrome painted glass, with blue borders.
Altar and memorials
An alabaster statue of the Virgin Mary stands beneath the axial window behind the high altar. She is identified as the Theotokos, a Christian title meaning “Mother of God.” The late fifteenth- or early sixteenth-century altar of relics in the south aisle combines Flamboyant Gothic and Renaissance forms. It bears the arms of Nicolas le Sane, canon and archdeacon of Port, together with those of the bishops of Toul and the cathedral chapter.
The cathedral contains numerous recumbent effigies and mortuary plaques, including effigies of Mansuy of Toul, Gérard of Toul, and another bishop. Forty-three floor monuments are classified, and additional examples are located in the cloister.
Cloister
The Gothic cloister is a three-gallery complex measuring approximately 157 linear metres. Its east gallery is about 65 metres long and contains ten bays, the south gallery extends about 40 metres with six openings, and the west gallery measures about 52 metres with eight bays. The east gallery began around 1240 in the Rayonnant Gothic style, an earlier Gothic phase emphasizing radiating tracery and large glazed openings.
Gutters and gargoyles carry rainwater away from the cloister, a technically advanced construction method for its period. The north gallery incorporates the chapter house, the room used by the cathedral chapter, the body of canons responsible for the institution’s liturgical and administrative life. A large Rayonnant Gothic window opening toward the garden once closed the chapter house. The cloister roofs were temporarily covered with corrugated metal for about sixty years before their restoration between 2009 and 2010.
Dome, bells, and organ
Bell towers and bells
The “Golden Ball” dome rises over the crossing. Between the western facade towers stands the Renaissance bell tower erected in 1534, with a colonnade, Corinthian capitals, semicircular arches, and a dome. Its bell dates from 1536.
The first documented cathedral bells sounded in 1497, probably from the south-west tower. Their exact number and casting dates are unknown, although there were probably four. Three large bells made in 1534 weighed approximately 14,000, 10,000, and 6,000 pounds, and a fourth bell was installed in the Renaissance facade carillon in 1536 to strike the hours.
By the French Revolution, eight bells were distributed between the Saint Gérard tower and the Saint Stephen tower. Most were melted down during the Revolution. The surviving bells were recast in 1820 into four new bells, all of which were lost in the June 1940 fire. Five bells were cast by the Causard foundry at Colmar in 1961. In 2023, three further bells made by the Capanni foundry in Castelnovo ne’ Monti were added during work on the bell frame and ringing system.
Organ
The cathedral has possessed an organ since at least the fourteenth century. Nicolas Dupont’s 1755 instrument had four keyboards and forty-one stops, with a case whose sculptures were made by Athanase Lacourt of Toul. The present Schwenkedel-Kœnig instrument is neo-Classical. It has four manuals, a 32-note concave pedalboard, approximately 4,896 pipes, and 70 registers.
Roof and surviving structure
The current roof follows the form that existed before 1940. Slate is laid over a high metal framework, reproducing the earlier geometry after the wartime fire and the long period of temporary roofing. Restoration of the exterior, including the facade and towers, was carried out in successive phases, while restoration of the lateral vaults and the Bishops’ Chapel remains pending.
