Villard de Honnecourt: Builder of Cathedrals

The thirty-three pages of this parchment 'album,' covered with notes and drawings, speak directly to us of a world about which we know very little. Villard de Honnecourt, thirteenth-century architect, engineer and journalist, 'greets you and bids all of those laboring at the tasks described in this book to pray for his soul and remember him kindly, for herein-contained is information of great value' - not only about the practical problems of stone and timberwork, but also about what he saw on his travels around France and to Hungary, his working sketches for the cathedrals he built or planned along the way, and the principles of the Gothic architecture which expressed so magnificently the spirit of his times.