Particular topics of interest

The notion of circuit

The notion of canonical labyrinth

The spelling of the name Reims and others

The 28-day lunar cycle and the "lunations" of the Chartres labyrinth

The influence of the Roman labyrinth in the invention of the Medieval labyrinth

The medieval "christianization" of the labyrinth

Is the labyrinth an archetype?

The engraver's lateral inversion

Villard de Honnecourt and the mirror-image of the Chartres labyrinth

Eric of Auxerre's 860 labyrinth

A circuit is a complete course around the labyrinth. Thus there are 3- 7- and 11-circuit labyrinths. In the case of Medieval and Roman labyrinths, it cannot be used with that meaning. The Roman labyrinth has only one circuit. The canonical Medieval labyrinth has three circuits; the non-canonical Medieval labyrinth can theoretically have any number of circuits.

The word lane has the meaning of a highway lane or a running track lane or corridor, which is a physical width inside which you drive or run; you can change from one lane to another. The lane is not the path: it is a multiple space where the path is laid or traced. The circuit is not the lane: it is a portion of the path.

In my rhythmical theory of the Medieval labyrinth, I have first used the expression "round course" to designate the three-step circuit. I did not use "circuit" because of the current utilisation of that word in a different and incorrect meaning. I have now decided to use the word "circuit".

The canonical Cretan labyrinth is built around the cross, either with the help of the so-called nucleus or seed pattern, or directly through the extension of the arms of the cross around it. Therefore it is formed of 2 lines whose intersection is the cross. Its structure must furthermore be symmetrical: the extensions of each arm of the cross must wind the same number of times around it. It has no circular central medallion. It has normally 7 lanes (or circuits), but can have 3, 11, 15 or more lanes (by increments of 4, if it is to be symmetrical). The variants studied by Tony Phillips and Willem Kuipers may be called Cretan, but they are not canonical because they are not built from the cross, and some are not symmetrical.

The canonical Roman labyrinth is normally built on 4 quadrants, but I think variants on 3 and 6 quadrants should also be considered canonical. Each quadrant contains an identical labyrinth-maeander (with the same rotation direction). Labyrinths with mutually symmetrical maeanders (with opposite rotation direction) are not canonical. Each maeander (or each phase, in the case of multiple-phase maeanders) must also be symmetrical unto itself.

Lyon/Lyons. This is also a French city. The correct French spelling is Lyon.

The pronunciation of Auxerre (also a French city): the Larousse French dictionary suggests "osserre".

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The connection with the labyrinth? Only indirect. It concerns only the "floor" version of the Chartres labyrinth. But since that labyrinth is by far the best known and the most commented upon by authors writing about the labyrinth, this notion is in fact very frequent in the literature. My point is that that notion is incorrect.

It has become customary, especially among English-speaking authors, to call "lunations" the decorative motifs which adorn the periphery of the Chartres floor labyrinth. The semicircular spaces delimited by two neighboring "teeth" indeed look like half-moons. The number of those "half-moons" is 112 and therefore equals four 28-day lunar months. From this, it was inferred that the labyrinth had been used in the calculation of the date of Easter (or at least in illustrating that calculation). This lunar motif was even identified as being the basis of the specifically feminine symbolism of the Chartres labyrinth, which is obviously lost when the "lunations" are not included in certain reproductions.

Unfortunately, numbers don't add up to that theory.

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Obviously, the Cretan and the Medieval labyrinths have in common an important difference with the Roman labyrinth: both have a continuous and non-repetitive path structure, whereas the typical Roman labyrinth was formed of four identical labyrinths, each one in its own quadrant and being traveled in its turn.

However, I don't think that the transition was that rapid or simple. The fact that no labyrinth manuscript older than the 9th century is known to us does not mean that none existed. We know that the copy and illustration of manuscripts was practiced before that time even if few older manuscripts came down to us. Furthermore, I think that the labyrinth drawn on a manuscript was by itself an invitation to trace its path with the finger, which certainly brought an early destruction of several of those manuscripts.

Besides, it is undeniable that the Medieval labyrinth has a certain number of properties in common with the Roman labyrinth, which labyrinth was certainly known by the draftsmen and illustrators of the centuries preceeding our first labyrinth manuscripts. The Roman labyrinth was present in most of the Roman Empire, as a mosaic floor decoration, particularly in France, from the 3rd century, and in Christian Algeria, from the 4th century.

1. The most apparent of these properties is the division of the labyrinth into four quadrants. It is now usually interpreted (wrongly, I think) as a "christianization" by the superimposition of the motif of the cross.

2. Another property shared with the Roman labyrinth is the central medallion. The Cretan labyrinth had no central space, but a simple termination of the path-lane into a dead-end.

3. A common property which is less obvious but may be more fundamental than the others, is the subjacent general geometric structure, which is concentric, whereas that of the Cretan is spiral.

4. Finally, the Medieval labyrinth, as early as the oldest known manuscripts, often had an illustration in its central medallion, as most of the Roman labyrinths. And in both cases that illustration usually refers to the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur.

It would be difficult to believe that all those properties were invented independently of the Roman model of the labyrinth, which was known and which already had them all.

Nevertheless, the Medieval labyrinthth is very different from the Roman labyrinth. The influence of the Cretan labyrinth shows in the continuity of the path (the path of the Roman labyrinth is not structurally continuous: it is built from the repetition of the same short path from quadrant to quadrant). But the important innovation of the Medieval labyrinth is in its rhythmical structure, which makes it absolutely different from both of its predecessors.

Therefore, the development of the specifically medieval model of the labyrinth would have happened during the centuries preceding our oldest labyrinth manuscripts. It would have proceeded principally from the Roman model of the labyrinth. Unfortunately, there remains no trace of the researches, gropings, trials and discoveries, that we may imagine, but that we will probably never know.

The Cretan labyrinth is often present on the medieval manuscripts; the Roman one never is. This might be explained by the fact that, although the Roman labyrinth has certain interesting properties, which were indeed carried into the newly invented Medieval labyrinth, by itself it offers little interest. The Cretan labyrinth is of a very superior aesthetic and graphic quality, and the new Medieval labyrinth is incomparably superior from all points of view. In particular, its rhythmical quality, which I think was precisely the reason of the research which led to its development, practically renders the other labyrinths uninteresting.

My hypothesis is that the design of the Medieval labyrinth was already developped and spread in the scriptoria at the very beginning of the 9th century (maybe even before). Since the manuscripts from that period in general are very few, and since in particular the labyrinths drawn in the manuscripts have probably been worn out from the fingers "tracing" or "traveling" them, it would be normal that there subsist almost no labyrinth manuscripts, and that those who do are neither the most interesting not the most representative of what was done.

Indeed, the few labyrinths which we have from the 9th century are either of little rhythmical (and graphic) interest or badly drawn, or decorated of rich colors which would invoke some respect from curious fingers. Eventually, this fascination with the rhythmical structure of the labyrinth would weaken and disappear, allowing some of the labyrinths to survive until now.

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The Roman labyrinth was built upon a four-quadrant scheme. It could be found, as floor mosaics, in France (Lyon and Blois, 3rd century) and in several other places in Europe. It was certainly known by medieval draftsmen.

Of course, that quadrant structure can be likened to the cross motif, but in the present context, that motif is purely accidental and is only the result of the partition of the space into quadrants.

The medieval labyrinth research was trying, among other things, to render the path more complex. In this situation, it was perfectly logical to borrow the already-known quadrant structure. Interpreting that design decision as a "christianization" of the labyrinth is therefore unwarramted.

If the medieval illustrators had really wanted to christianize in that way the labyrinth, the motif of the cross would have been clearly emphasized, either by extending and completing certain lines belonging to the cross, or by adding appropriate secondary but effective decorative motifs.

In the literature concerning Medieval times, it is customary to give a religious intention and meaning to all the actions of the medieval people. Thus the gothic vault would have been designed to symbolize the elevation of the soul towards heaven. And the draftsmen intention in inventing the Medieval labyrinth would have been to create a religious and christian symbol. The gothic vault is a technical realization in which very little place is left for expressing sentiments or attitudes other than the architect's sensibility to the material's behaviour and to the forms hemakes from these materials. In the same way, the medieval manuscript labyrinth is a technical feat where all details fit in an internal logic of necessity, leaving little place to any symbolic or religious expression.

Medieval people are not only religious and mystical subjects, always preoccupied with philosophy and sacred geometry: we should stop always looking for the trace of those spiritual preoccupations in all their works.

Besides, a large proportion of the Medieval labyrinths, even among the earliest manuscripts, and even among floor labyrinths, have in their central medallion illustrations related to the pagan myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. This of course contradicts the thesis of a medieval will to christianize the labyrinth.

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