The pavement labyrinths of the cathedrals: from Chartres to Lucca
Chartres, Amiens, Reims, Lucca, Pavia: the history of the labyrinths laid in the floors and walls of medieval churches, between Theseus and the soul.
In the nave of Chartres Cathedral, among the rows of chairs that often cover it, a great circle of pale and dark stone stretches across the floor. A single path, with no branches, winds through eleven concentric rings before reaching the centre. It is the most famous of the medieval pavement labyrinths, made in all likelihood in the first decades of the thirteenth century, when the cathedral was rebuilt after the fire of 1194.
From the myth of Crete to the church
The labyrinth is a very ancient image. Greek myth tells that Daedalus built it at Knossos for King Minos, to imprison the Minotaur, and that Theseus escaped from it thanks to Ariadne's thread. The Romans often depicted it in the floor mosaics of their villas, sometimes with Theseus and the monster at the centre. Medieval Christianity inherited this form and turned it into a symbol of the soul's journey through the world and sin towards salvation.
Unlike modern mazes, medieval labyrinths are almost always unicursal: one cannot take a wrong turning, but the path is very long and constantly changes direction, approaching and moving away from the centre just when one seems to have reached it. It is not a puzzle to be solved, but an itinerary to be completed with patience. This structure lent itself well to a moral interpretation: human life proceeds by turns and returns, and only perseverance leads to the goal.
A European map
Besides Chartres, France preserves the octagonal labyrinth of Amiens, dated 1288 and extensively remade in the nineteenth century, which at its centre recorded the names of the bishop and the architects of the cathedral. That of Reims, which also showed the builders, was destroyed in 1779. Here the labyrinth took on the value of a signature: the architect presented himself as a new Daedalus, builder of a marvellous edifice.
In Italy, under the portico of the cathedral of San Martino in Lucca, a small labyrinth is carved on a pillar, accompanied by a Latin inscription saying it was built by Daedalus of Crete and recalling Theseus and Ariadne. In Pavia, in the church of San Michele Maggiore, fragments survive of a floor mosaic with the labyrinth and the Minotaur. Piacenza and Pontremoli have also preserved evidence of this motif.
The «road to Jerusalem»
One often reads that the faithful walked the labyrinths on their knees as a substitute for pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and that for this reason they were called «chemin de Jérusalem». In reality this name is attested only in the early modern period, and we have no medieval descriptions of such a devotional use. There is, however, evidence of an Easter dance performed by the canons of Auxerre Cathedral, with a ball thrown while the path was followed.
The meaning of the labyrinths, then, was not single. They could be a memory of classical culture, a proud signature of the builders, a moral image of the path towards salvation, a part of the Easter liturgy. In the myth, moreover, Theseus defeating the Minotaur could be read as a figure of Christ overcoming the devil. It is precisely this plurality of meanings that makes labyrinths one of the richest symbolic forms of medieval architecture.
In the twentieth century labyrinths came back into fashion as paths for meditation, and many have been laid out in churches, gardens and hospitals all over the world on the model of Chartres. It is a new use, not to be confused with the medieval one, but it shows the vitality of a design able to speak to very different ages.