Reims Cathedral

Timeline

1. c. 496

   Baptism of Clovis

   Frankish king Clovis I is baptized at Reims by Bishop Remigius (Saint Remi), founding the link between the French monarchy and the city.

2. 816

   Coronation of Louis the Pious

   Pope Stephen IV crowns Louis the Pious at Reims, inaugurating the cathedral's role as the site of royal coronations.

3. 862

   Carolingian Cathedral Dedicated

   Archbishop Hincmar dedicates an 86-meter Carolingian basilica with two transepts in the presence of Emperor Charles the Bald.

4. 6 May 1210

   Fire Destroys Earlier Church

   A devastating fire on 6 May destroys the previous cathedral, opening the way for the High Gothic rebuild that follows.

5. 6 May 1211

   Construction of Present Cathedral

   Construction begins exactly one year after the fire, starting at the east end with the choir under Archbishop Aubry de Humbert.

6. 1233-1236

   Citizens' Revolt

   Heavy taxes on the building project provoke a citizen uprising against the city's clergy, halting construction for several years.

7. 17 July 1429

   Coronation of Charles VII

   Joan of Arc leads Charles VII through the gates of Reims to be crowned, turning the cathedral into a national symbol of France.

8. 1475

   North Tower Completed

   The north tower of the west facade is finally finished, three decades after the south tower, completing the main fabric.

9. 1825

   Final Royal Coronation

   Charles X is the last French monarch to be crowned at Reims, ending a thousand-year tradition of royal anointment.

10. 19 September 1914

    Great War Bombardment

    German artillery sets the roof ablaze; half the stained glass is destroyed and many sculpted figures are scorched or shattered.

11. 1938

    Post-War Reopening

    After two decades of restoration led by architect Henri Deneux, the cathedral reopens to the public, partly funded by Rockefeller money.

12. 1974

    Chagall Stained Glass

    Marc Chagall's deep-blue stained-glass windows are installed in the east apse, adding a 20th-century masterpiece to the medieval ensemble.

13. 1991

    UNESCO Inscription

    Inscribed as a World Heritage Site together with the Palais du Tau and the Saint-Remi Basilica and former abbey complex.

Detailed History

Notre-Dame de Reims rises on a site sanctified since the 5th century, when Bishop Nicasius transferred the city's cathedral to this location atop a Gallo-Roman bath built under the Emperor Constantine. Around 496 the Frankish king Clovis I was baptized here by Bishop Remigius — the event that bound Reims to royal ritual for the next thirteen centuries. In 816 Louis the Pious was crowned at Reims by Pope Stephen IV, and around 818 Archbishop Ebbo and the royal architect Rumaud began a much larger Carolingian cathedral using stone from the old city walls. In October 862 Archbishop Hincmar dedicated the new church before Emperor Charles the Bald — an 86-meter basilica with two transepts. The present Gothic cathedral was begun on 6 May 1211, replacing an earlier church destroyed by fire on 6 May 1210. Construction started at the east end with the choir. Heavy taxes triggered a citizen revolt in 1233-1236, but the choir was finished by mid-century and most of the building bar the west end was complete by 1300. During the Hundred Years' War English forces besieged the city in 1359-1360, halting work, but the west end advanced through the 14th century, and the south tower was finished in 1445, the north tower in 1475. In July 1429 Joan of Arc led the dauphin Charles VII to Reims for his coronation — the event that turned the cathedral into a national symbol. From Louis the Pious in 816 to Charles X in 1825, thirty-two kings were anointed at Reims (twenty-five within the present building). The French Revolution damaged the sculptures but spared the structure. A national restoration voted in 1875 invested the equivalent of some 80,000 euros to repair the statues, but on 19 September 1914 German artillery during the Battle of the Marne set the roof ablaze, melted lead onto sculpted figures, and destroyed half the stained glass. Rebuilding under Henri Deneux began after the armistice and was completed in 1938 with American philanthropic support from John D. Rockefeller Jr. Marc Chagall's deep-blue stained-glass windows were installed in the east apse in 1974, and another set by Imi Knoebel followed in 2011 for the 800th anniversary. In 1991 the cathedral was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List with the adjoining Palais du Tau and the Saint-Remi Basilica.

Cultural Significance

Notre-Dame de Reims stands beside Chartres and Amiens as one of the three supreme cathedrals of French Classical Gothic. The 1991 UNESCO inscription groups it with two related monuments — the Palais du Tau, the archbishop's palace and staging ground for coronation rites, and the Saint-Remi Basilica, burial church of Saint Remigius — to convey the full ritual landscape of the coronation tradition. The Smiling Angel on the north portal is regarded as the masterpiece of 13th-century French sculpture: among the first works to bring a gentle, knowing smile into Gothic stone, anticipating the humanism of later medieval art. The role as coronation site ended with Charles X in 1825, but the Holy Ampulla — the vial containing the anointing oil — survives at the Palais du Tau as the most symbolic relic of the French monarchy. Rossini's Il viaggio a Reims was composed for the 1825 coronation; Georges Bataille's first essay, Notre-Dame de Reims (1918), is a love letter to the building; and in 1959 the Paris-school painter Tsuguharu Foujita was baptized here, taking the name Leonard Foujita. After 1914 the ruined cathedral became a rallying point for France and a touchstone in Franco-German reconciliation — in 1962 General de Gaulle and Chancellor Adenauer attended Mass together in its nave.

Architectural Details

Notre-Dame de Reims is a three-aisled basilica of mature High Gothic design: about 138.75 m long, 30 m wide, and 38 m to the apex of the nave vault. The plan keeps the early-Gothic five-sided polygonal apse rather than the irregular layout of Chartres, giving Reims an unusually regular geometry. The west facade is the most original feature: above three recessed portals, the tympana that would normally hold sculpture are replaced by smaller rose windows, with the narrative pushed up into the gables — an inversion unique to Reims. The sculpture program is vast, including the Smiling Angel, the Coronation of the Virgin gable, and the Gallery of Kings above the rose. Inside, Reims uses the classic three-level Gothic elevation — arcade, four-light triforium, clerestory — supported by pilier cantonné (a cylinder with four engaged shafts) and four-part rib vaults. Its great innovation was tracery in the clerestory: paired lancets crowned by a six-foil oculus, dissolving the wall into glass. This template shaped Rayonnant Gothic across Europe, including Saint-Chapelle in Paris. Externally, double-tier flying buttresses brace the nave, and the aisle pinnacles bear winged angels — earning the informal name 'cathedral of angels'. The south tower was finished in 1445 and the north in 1475; spires planned for both were never built, leaving the silhouette its flat-topped profile.