Financing Chartres 11th century Cathedral - begging for building funds

Popular thought has it that the Knights Templars were "the builders" of the gothic cathedrals such as the one in Chartres, France. As for Chartres, the first building phase of a big cathedral followed the 1020 fire. This is a century before Templar times. If the Templars did not, who did pay for this early building project? A reconstruction.

"After the fire on September 7, 1020 Bishop Fulbert of Chartres devoted the winter of 1020 to clearing away the débris, and so active was the work, that by September in the following year (1021) Fulbert could write ‘we have finished our crypts, and we must devote all our energies to covering them before the inclemency of the winter damages them.’ In the following year the work had made such progress that he was able to undertake a journey at King Robert’s request to Rome, leaving the building to his canons and architect. Who that architect was may perhaps be indicated by the entry in the Nécrologie de Notre-Dame, under date October 22:—Bérenger. ‘Berengarius hujus matris ecclesiæ, Artifex Bonus.’ (Berengarius of this mother church, Good Artisan, TN)

Fulbert also set about procuring funds to build first a veritable crypt, and then above it the new Cathedral, adopting, however, the general plan of the church left by his predecessor in order to make use of the enormous existing foundations. The subterranean aspect of the old church, built about the grottoes and heaped round by the rapid deposit of rubbish which continually raised the soil of mediæval towns, would naturally suggest this scheme. But to carry it out, funds beyond the ordinary were needed.

Fortunately Fulbert was no ordinary beggar. Not only did he know how to use the usual means of encouraging gifts, in money and in kind, from the clergy and people of the diocese by holding special assemblies on the site of the proposed church, and by sermons which promised heavenly rewards for those who took part in the building, but he used his connections with the great world and his power of letter-writing to the best advantage.

He wrote first of all to ‘his beloved Lord,’ the ‘good King Robert,’ in whom the historian sees more of a monk than of a sovereign. ‘All our resources fail us for the rebuilding of our church, and a great necessity is upon us. Come then to our aid, O holy father; strengthen our weakness and succour our distress to the end that God may reward your soul with all blessings.’ And doubtless the ‘father of religious architecture’ responded generously to this eloquent appeal from his former teacher. (...)

Fulbert wrote next to his most beloved and pious Duke of Aquitaine, and he received handsome annual subscriptions from him whilst the Cathedral was a-building. (...) Eudes II, Count of Chartres and Blois, was, before he met his death in the Battle of Bar-le-Duc, a generous contributor. That was to be expected from so rich a seigneur for the restoration of the principal church of his own county and town, but deeply was Fulbert touched by the receipt of a contribution from Cnut, King of Denmark and England, who, as William of Malmesbury records, ‘sent many sums to the churches across the seas, and chiefly enriched that of Chartres, where flourished Fulbert, renowned for his holiness and philosophy.’ (...)

Henry I (...) owed his succession in some degree, as we have seen, to Fulbert. He cancelled his debt in part by paying for the wooden roof of the Cathedral. Wooden, for the art of extensive vaulting in stone was not yet understood (in 1028) whilst Henry’s doctor, Jean le Sourd, the Chartrain pupil of Fulbert and leader of the sect of Nominalists in the battle of the schools, was responsible for the construction of the south gate and many other details. Teudon, who had made the Sainte Chasse for the Veil, undertook the principal façade. A big bell weighing 5000 livres was also hung in one of Vulphard’s towers, which still stood.

Such were the means by which the courtly bishop extracted donations from the great, and such the spiritual consolation with which he rewarded the generosity of his royal patrons.

Fulbert died in the year 1028, but so rapid had the work been that he did not die before his Cathedral was complete. Fulbert himself left a great part of his wealth to complete the work which he had begun. That work was carried on by his successor, Theodoric. But it must have been interrupted for a while by the terrible famine which came upon France at this period. (...) it was not till the year 1037 that the solemn dedication of the Cathedral by Theodoric took place in the presence of Henri I and his whole Court" 

Another interesting link.

This blog quotes, with minor alterations, sections of the book The Story of Chartres, by Cecil Headlam (1902), source Gutenberg.org. The illustration shows a miniature from the Obituaire de Notre-Dame de Chartres (11e-12e eeuw), representing Fulbert de Chartres, source, Public Domain.

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