Cathedral by David Macaulay, 1973.

This is the story of the construction of a Medieval cathedral. The story takes place in a fictional town in France, Chutreaux, but it is based on the construction of real Medieval cathedrals.

In 1252, the people of Chutreaux decide to build a new cathedral because their old cathedral was badly damaged by a lightning strike and other towns in their part of France are building grand cathedrals. The people know that it takes decades to construct a grand cathedral, perhaps even more than 100 years. The people making the decision to build the cathedral know that they will never see the end of the construction themselves, but they believe that this is an important undertaking, both for the welfare of their community in the future and for the glory of God.

The church leader in Chutreaux is the bishop, but a group of clergymen have been given control of money for the cathedral project. They have chosen to hire a Flemish architect, William of Planz, to create the design for their cathedral and hire the craftsmen who will actually build the cathedral.

Building a cathedral is a massive undertaking that requires many different types of craftsmen and laborers. The book explains that the craftsmen building the cathedral will include a quarryman, a stone cutter, a mason, a sculptor, a mortar maker, a blacksmith, a carpenter, a glass maker, and a roofer. All of these craftsmen are masters of their crafts, with apprentices, assistants, and many general, unskilled laborers doing much of the heavy work.

The building of the cathedral begins with the clearing of the site, marking the basic layout of the building, and building workshops where the craftsmen will be doing their work. The book shows the tools that the various types of craftsmen use. They also need to gather the materials that they will use. There is a quarry where they will cut the limestone blocks they will use to construct the cathedral, and the wood for the roof is brought from Scandinavia by boat.

From there, the cathedral is built in stages, beginning with the foundation and then the walls. The book explains each step of the construction and how it was managed, giving the dates when each phase is completed. It also explains the purpose of various architectural features, such as the flying buttresses that support the walls. There is also a glossary in the back of the book that defines various architectural terms.

Because this is an extremely long-term project, over the course of the book, William of Planz and various craftsmen age and one person dies in a work-related accident, and they are replaced by younger people. The construction is finally finished 86 years after it was started.

I recommended this book to people after the burning of Notre Dame in Paris last year because this cathedral is similar to Notre Dame and can give people an idea of what went into its construction. I think that the time invested in the cathedral construction is one of the key points of the story. The ability to delay gratification in the pursuit of larger goals is an important life skill, but the people who began the cathedral project showed this ability to an even higher degree than most. The book carefully notes that the people of this town understand that they will never see the final product of their contribution of money and labor because the project will take decades to complete, but they still begin the undertaking because they believe that it is the right thing to do for their community, for future generations, and for God. Their ultimate reward is not in immediately profiting from this project but in their legacy, laying the foundations (literally) for the future. In the end, it is their grandchildren who become the ones to complete the project and enjoy the beauty of the finished cathedral, and they consider it more than worth the wait.

The book was also made into a documentary film. The film follows the basic course of the book but with more focus on the lives of the characters, giving them more personality than the book does and inserting more drama into the construction of the cathedral. The story of the town and townspeople alternates with explanations about the history and architecture of cathedrals. The fictional cathedral serves as an example not only of the process of constructing a Medieval cathedral, but the difficulties and dangers it might involve.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).