Throughout the 18th century, French engineers were well
ahead of many of their European counterparts. It thus comes as no surprise to find
documents in the Nationalmuseum’s architectural drawings collection testifying
to the interest of Swedish directors of public works in original French bridges
from the 17th and 18th centuries. As in many other fields, models were
collected for the purpose of adapting proven technical solutions to local
needs. This thirst for knowledge is also reflected in notebooks and sketchbooks,
among them a compilation of notes in the Royal Library, Stockholm, that seems
to originate from Carl Hårleman’s Parisian stay in the early 1720s, including an
explanation and an exercise on how to construct long-lasting and cheaper
bridges.[i] Notes
from Carl Johan Cronstedt’s European studies likewise bear witness to this interest
in building in and close to water, an interest probably awakened in the first
year of his studies under Christopher Polhem.[ii]
In two manuscripts, Cronstedt also summarises (and sometimes translates from
French into Swedish) technical information on such matters as vaulting and
bridges, deriving from Bélidor, Bullet, Daviler, Félibien and the Royal Swedish
Academy of Sciences, and his sketchbooks record field studies of several French
bridges.[iii] In
the following, I will mainly examine drawings of French bridges held in the Nationalmuseum’s
Cronstedt Collection, discuss their provenance, and very briefly suggest how this
technical material may have been exploited.
The Pont Royal – Paris
On 28 February 1684, the Pont Rouge, facing the
Louvre, was swept away during a flood; the following year, work began on the Pont Royal. The identity of its author
is still discussed; the bridge has been attributed to Jacques Gabriel, Jules
Hardouin Mansart, Pierre Bullet, Pierre Deslile and François Romain, possibly suggesting
a collaboration between several (or all) of these contemporaries.[iv]
The bridge was a pioneering achievement, in that it was built in record time
(1685–88), was the first bridge spanning the Seine without the support of an
island, and the first in France in which use was made of pozzolana.[v]
The
Cronstedt Collection includes three series of drawings showing various stages in
this project: preliminary studies, design, and the building site.
The first
series, comprising three wash drawings, records pre-studies of an already built
urban environment. One sheet shows the site of the old bridge and a proposal for
a new one, further to the west, in line with the Tuileries Palace and the Rue
du Bac (CC 270). The relief of the riverbank is shown in detail, and on the left
bank the areas and owners of the built plots are specified. A second sheet shows
the façades of these houses, with a text explaining that their ground floors lay
below the stone-paved street of the existing quay (CC 2211), which may be
interpreted as an argument for remodelling them.[vi] A
third sheet presents detailed plans of the houses, as well as the abutment of
the new bridge (CC 79).[vii]
The
second series, a drawing and an engraving, presents the design of the bridge in
elevation, plan and section (CC 622 and CC 623).[viii]
The engraving indicates some hesitation, with a handwritten note saying “bridge
corrected” (pont corrigé) (verso) and
with the lower stones of the arches and the foundation stones of the piers coloured
in red (recto) – the form of the bridge arches was discussed at the Royal
Academy of Architecture. The design and the colours of the drawing also match a
drawing of an anonymous bridge pier (CC 638).
The third
series, consisting of three sketches by the Flemish monk Liévin Cruyl (c. 1640–1720), records a building site with
work in progress. Like a photographer, the artist captures three moments in
time, showing the hierarchy, the different tasks and tools involved in building
in water, and how the workers (men and horses) were equipped. Two of the
sketches are signed Liv. Cruyl auditer
declineat mense octobre 1686, and all three are remains of preliminary studies
for Cruyl’s famous propaganda engravings of this royal project.[ix] The
first drawing bears the title Moulin à
quatre ou huit chevaux pour debacqueter l’eau avec une lanterne, la roue de […] diametre, and corresponds to a
detail of a coloured drawing in the Destailleur Collection at the French
National Library (fig. 1).[x] Viewing
the scene from the left bank, it shows two men supervising the workers: one seems
to be observing, while the other is giving instructions to three men operating a
crane. On a platform below the bridge abutment, three men are transporting a large
stone block on a wagon, a fourth man is hammering, and a fifth one is
attempting to reach a board. Another man tends the
horses that are turning the wheel of the pumping engine, and four horses are
drinking on the riverbank. Entitled “Water mill with two lanterns”, the second
sheet also presents a detail from a drawing in the Destailleur Collection (fig.
2).[xi] This
sketch once again records intense activity, but seen from the water side (the east):
two men are supervising two horse-driven “lanterns”, another is stacking blocks
of stone, four men are talking, and three are working on a bridge pier, two of
them turning a crankshaft, with a mason building the actual pier. Neither
signed nor dated, the third sheet (CC 640) is a summary sketch of a detail in
one of Cruyl’s engravings from 1687, recording the “construction of the arches
of the bridge at the Louvre” (fig. 3).[xii]
A bird’s-eye view from the water side, it shows the centering for the
construction of the three northern arches: twelve men are working on a floating
platform, using four cranes to lift blocks of stone and barrels from a boat; five
men on the northern bridge pier are receiving a block: two of them operate the
crane, one guides it with a rope, a fourth man catches the block, and a fifth applies
mortar.[xiii]
How and
when did these drawings reach Stockholm? In 1919, three similar drawings of the
bridge signed by Cruyl and published by Edgar Mareuse were still held at Saint-Fargeau
(owned by Mme Wattine, née Lacour), the former estate of the Pelletier family.[xiv] According
to Mareuse, the name Le Pelletier de
Souzy was written on one of these drawings, and the same person is probably
portrayed in another of Cruyl’s engravings. Claude Le Pelletier de Souzy (–1711)
succeeded Colbert as contrôleur général
des finances in 1683, holding the position until 1689, and was thus responsible
for the construction of the Pont Royal.[xv] Cronstedt’s
library at Fullerö also holds a document regarding another bridge in Lyon, présenté de la part de monsieur Le Peletier
conseiller d’état et intendant des finances (17 August 1688), which
like the drawings considered here may come from the archives of Le Pelletier or
those of Pierre Bullet. We know that Bullet received several commissions from
the Le Pelletier family, that Hårleman studied under his son Jean-Baptiste
Bullet de Chamblain, and that substantial parts of Bullet’s archives are held
in the Hårleman Collection (THC).[xvi] Equally,
this material may originate from François Romain (–1735) or Claude Mathieu (–1732),
as both men died in Paris during C. J. Cronstedt’s stay there (1732–35). This
last hypothesis finds some support in the fact that Mathieu is cited in the
above-mentioned Lyon document, and that there is also in the Cronstedt Collection
a drawing of the Saint-Pourçain bridge in Auvergne, designed
and built by Mathieu in 1687 (CC 649).[xvii] Another possibility is that (some of) the material
was purchased by Tessin the Younger during his stay in Paris in 1687, since
in a letter at the time he underlines the quality of Cruyl’s drawings.[xviii]
The Pont de Bâteaux – Rouen
The
Cronstedt Collection also includes seven drawings of the Bridge of Boats in
Rouen, which C. J. Cronstedt most probably studied in situ prior to its
publication by J. Adeline in the Encyclopédie. This bridge was a vulnerable and expensive structure
resting on nineteen boats, constructed in 1628–30 and improved by the Augustinian
monk Nicolas Le Bourgeois in the early 18th century. Two unsigned but dated ink
drawings (1 and 2 June 1708) show the bridge abutment and the quay, with
explanations concerning changes suggested by Le Bourgeois (CC 615 and CC 3815).[xix]
Three wash drawings (15 and 20 May 1710) specify three water levels and show
the bridge abutment with a system to open and close the bridge (CC 590, CC 316
and CC 317, fig. 4). Finally, an undated and unsigned ink drawing, probably made
by C. J. Cronstedt during one of his visits to Rouen, details Le Bourgeois’s machinery,
with pulleys and wires (CC 3791). Swedish interest in this design can be attributed
to the use of floating bridges in Sweden since the mid 17th century, which were
very vulnerable to the harsh winters and spring floods. After severe flooding
in 1727 and 1728, Polhem suggested an improved system that was first used for the
new bridge over the river Dalälven at Husby Church (near Stjärnsund). Polhem
was most probably experimenting with this system when Cronstedt was his student.[xx]
The Cronstedt Collection also holds a drawing of Le Bourgeois’s swing bridge at the western side of the Tuileries Gardens (1716–18), published in Jean François Blondel’s Cours d’architecture (1771, vol. 4), connecting the gardens with the Champs Elysées over a moat at the site of today’s Place de la Concorde (CC 110).[xxi] The Fullerö Collection at the Tekniska Museet (Museum of Science and Technology, Stockholm) includes a copperplate showing a water pump designed by Bourgeois, with an explanation in French and a letter written in Paris on 20 April 1761.[xxii] Ten years later F. A. U. Cronstedt, Cronstedt’s eldest son, travelled from Paris to Rome in the company of an architect named Bourgeois, the son of an “old architect in Paris who made a fortune”, which might be interpreted as a clue to how (parts of) this material arrived in Stockholm.
The Pont de Neuilly – Paris
In C. J.
Cronstedt’s handwritten notes on building technologies, the Pont de Neuilly
outside Paris is used to illustrate stone bridges. The text and drawings describe
the building site with work in progress in 1771: “The whole bridge is built only
with cut stone, bonded with cement. The mortar is not mixed with water, but the
slack-lime is taken fresh and mixed with sand.”[xxiii]
Cronstedt further refers to a drawing “in my papers” and describes a machine for lifting beams,
facilitating the construction of centering.[xxiv]
No drawing of such a contrivance has been found, but the collection does include
drawings of an odomètre[xxv]
and a mechanical saw (CC 636, CC 642 and CC 1189, fig. 5). Other sheets
represent Jean-Rodolphe Perronet’s hanging centering (CC 310) and his camion prismatique (CC 339), which were
published ten years later in his book Pont
de Neuilly (1782).[xxvi]
The collection also holds projects for two of Perronet’s never-executed
bridges: the Pont aux Fruits in Melun
from 1772 (CC 2889) and a wooden bridge close to the Salpêtrière (1773) in Paris (CC 3804 and CC 637, fig. 6).
In his Memoires, Perronet relates how his
project for a 150-foot arch, approved by the French Royal Academy of Sciences, was
sent to most of the learned societies in Europe.[xxvii]
As he was elected a member of Sweden’s Royal Academy of Sciences on 27 October 1772,
the drawings may have been part of his application. According to Bengt Ferner,
Cronstedt translated most speeches held by non-Swedish members of the Academy,
which could explain how the documents reached his collection.[xxviii]
Cronstedt and Perronet may also have met in Paris in the early 1730s, as the
French engineer worked for the Parisian city architect Jean Baptiste Augustin Beausire
from 1725 to 1735. In 1771, moreover, F. A. U. Cronstedt tells his father how
he, his brother Sven and a man called Ehrencrona walked to a bridge “under
construction opposite the Tuileries outside the city”;[xxix] and two months later he reports a day trip
with Jacques Germain Soufflot to observe the setting up of centering for the Pont
de Neuilly. He further explains how he copied drawings of these bridges, to show
his father how they “build in a light and dreadful manner nowadays, but also
what precautions they take in the choice of the materials”.[xxx]
The drawings
of French bridges in the Cronstedt Collection thus reflect research into pioneering
solutions.[xxxi]
Although Cronstedt’s work is often overshadowed by more ambitious contemporary
architects and masons, it is clear that (as Director of Public Works, 1753–67) he
actively worked to improve and modernise these complex structures that were of
benefit to the public. He contributed drawings for several bridges: Tullbron in
Falkenberg, Norrbro in Stockholm, Nykvarnsbro in Uppsala, Fittjabro, a drawbridge
in Jönköping and Kvistrumsbro in Göteborg, which, if they were built, were rarely
attributed to him.[xxxii]
Acknowledgments
Grateful thanks to
Count and Countess Carl Johan Cronstedt, for their kind permission to study the
fascinating documentation kept at Fullerö. This article presents some of the
results of broader, ongoing research projects funded by the B. Wallenberg, B.
& G. Rausing and R. & T. Söderberg Foundations, which have been greatly
facilitated by the Nationalmuseum’s recent digitisation of the Cronstedt C
[i] KB (Royal
Library, Stockholm), S 33, Överintendenten
riddaren Fredenheim, traités manuscrits sur l’architecture et sur la
méchanique, tirés de la collection des livres, des desseins et des estampes de
feu Monsieur Le baron de Hårleman,
den 4 mars 1729. Two of the texts dealing with bridges are written by
Pierre Bullet (according to Juliette Hernu-Bélaud).
[ii]
See one of Carl Johan Cronstedt’s notebooks (Tekniska Museet) and Linnéa
Rollenhagen Tilly, “Carl Johan Cronstedt in Paris (1732–35): Instruction, Contacts
and Purchases”, in Art Bulletin of Nationalmuseum Stockholm, vol. 15,
2008, pp. 101–108.
[iii] Cronstedt’s library holds two unpublished
manuscripts: Mémoires sur l’architecture and
C. J. Cronstedts egenhändiga anteckningar
om byggnadsteknik. See Rollenhagen Tilly, “Knowledge of Architecture and
Building Technologies in 18th Century Sweden”, in Robert Carvais,
André Guillerme, Valérie Nègre and Joël Sakarovitch, Nuts and Bolts of Construction History, Paris, 2012, vol. 1, pp.
409–417.
[iv] Isabelle
Dérens, “Pont-Royal”, in Alexandre Gady (ed.), Jules Hardouin-Mansart –
1646–1708, Paris, 2010,
pp. 540–544.
[v]
“Pozzolana [...] en slags rödaktig Sand eller Jord, som finnes kring om Neapel
och Rom, hwilken hafwer den egenskapen med sig, at då den blandas med Kalk,
blifwer den icke allenast hård uti Murning, Öfwer Watn utan ock inunder Watnet,
och binder sig mycket starkt tillsammans med Sten, af hvad slag denna må; [...]
Det vore til Önskandes at en sådan slags Sand kunde upfinnas här i Sverige, til
främjande af all Watn-Wärks, såsom Dammars, Broars och Slussars bygnader” (Cronstedt, Tal om sten-hus bygnad, KVA [Royal Swedish Academy
of Sciences], 1741 and 1755).
[vi] “La ligne
jaune marque le dessus du pavé du quay comme il est aujourd’huy élevé de 7
pi[eds] au dessus du rez de chaussée de la maison.”
[vii]
On the verso of this plan are the words: “Maisons du Mr Hulot au bout du pont
du Louvre”.
[viii]
This engraving is also held in the Hårleman Collection (THC), but without
corrections and on thicker paper (thanks to Wolfgang Nittnaus for this
information).
[ix] A series of seven views of the Pont
Royal executed during its construction (1685–89): two in the Wattinne Collection
(Edgar Mareuse, “Trois vues de Paris de Liévin Cruyl en 1686”, in Bulletin de la société de l’histoire de Paris, 1919, pp. 64–71), two at the
Louvre (Frits Lugt, Musée du Louvre. Inventaire général des dessins des écoles du Nord. Ecole flamande, I, Paris, 1949, nos. 549–50), and two in the
Bibliothèque nationale (F. Lugt, Bibliothèque nationale. Cabinet des
Estampes. Inventaire général des dessins des écoles du Nord, Paris, 1936,
nos. 277–78).
[xiii]
Destailleur, t. 4, 1093 BnF. A sheet of tracing paper at the Tekniska Museet
shows a detail of a horse mill and/or piledriver, which may correspond to
another, unidentified, Cruyl drawing.
[xiv]
Ink and wash drawings dated from 1686 and 1687 (Mareuse, op. cit.).
[xv]
Engraving signed Liévin Cruyl and dated 1687 (Mareuse, op. cit.).
[xvi] åke Stavenow, Carl Hårleman. En studie i frihetstidens
arkitekturhistoria, 1927. Erik
Langenskiöld, Pierre Bullet, the Royal
Architect, 1959. Runar Strandberg, Pierre
Bullet et J-B. de Ch. à la lumière des dessins de la collection Tessin-Hårleman du Musée National de
Stockholm, 1971.
[xvii] Claude
Mathieu was architecte
ordinaire des bâtiments du roi and ingénieur
du roi. From 1683, he was responsible for the Ponts et chaussées in Lyon, Moulins, Riom and parts of Bourges and
Orléans (Jean Mesqui, Le Pont en
France avant le temps des ingénieurs, 1986, p. 189).
[xviii]
Mareuse (op. cit.). One of these drawings was sold in London on 7 July 2009 and
another is today the property of a Parisian art gallery; for the latter, see
the cover illustration of Carvais et al., op. cit., vol. 3 (thanks to R.
Carvais for this information).
[xix] Jacques
Tanguy: http://www.rouen-histoire.com/Ponts/Pont_Bateaux.htm.
[xx]
“... parboliske eller rättare en kjedje figurs skapnad ock flyter på vattet
tjenlig att lägga öfver en ström” and “en dämning att lägga öfver hamnar af
träf ock som leder sig både verticalt ock horizontalt” (in C. J. Cronstedts egenhändiga ..., Fullerö), referring to KVA, vol.
4, p. 21, and vol. 14, p. 48. Also see Rudolf Kolm, “Flottbroar över Daläven”,
in Fornvännen, 1963, pp.
30–43.
[xxi]
A sketchbook from Cronstedt’s study trip (Fullerö) also records a swing
bridge in Venice and two floating bridges between Manheim and Mayence (both
resting on 44 boats).
[xxii]
Tekniska Museet 7404 J.
[xxiii] “Uti
hela bron är ej annat än huggen sten nytjades, som är med siment murades. Alt
bruket blandas ej med vaten utan släkta kalken tages färsker ock blandas med
sand” (C. J. Cronstedts egenhändiga ..., Fullerö).
[xxiv] Letter from
F. A. U. Cronstedt, 20 June 1771 (Fullerö).
[xxvi]
Camion prismatique, developed to transport
materials for the Pont de Neuilly.
[xxvii] “On ne
saurait trop y réfléchir avant que de renoncer à l’arche de 150 pieds dont la
gravure a été envoyée avec les œuvres du sieur Perronet, approuvées par
l’Académie des sciences à Paris, à presque toutes les compagnies savantes de
l’Europe, pour qu’une grande nation, telle que la France, qui doit favoriser le
progrès des arts pour sa propre illustration, ne soit pas taxée de trop de
crainte et de timidité, ou de manquer d’ingénieurs qui soient en état
d’entreprendre de pareils grands travaux” (J. Förstel, Perronet et la Seine,
http://www.iledefrance.fr/uploads/tx_base/Perronet_et_la_la_Seine.pdf, p. 13).
[xxviii] “... när någon utländsk ledamot höll sit inträdestal i
academien på sit modersmål var gref Cronstedt strax färdig at öfversätta det på
svenska språket til allmän uplysning fär at kunna införas i academiens
handlingar om det fans nyttigt” (Bengt Ferrner, “Åminnelse-tal,
öfver grefven herr Carl Johan Cronstedt”,
in K.wet: acad: åminnelse-tal, T.6:
1798); and Emilie Sottiau, Les réseaux de relations d’un homme de
science au siècle des Lumières: Jean-Rodolphe Perronet (1708–1794), Université de Marne la Vallée, 2007.
[xxix]
Letter from F. A. U. Cronstedt, 4 April 1771 (Fullerö).
[xxx]
“... för att roa min far ... att se med
hvad legeretet ock hardiesse de nu för tiden bygga, men ock vad precautioner i
materialerna de bruka” (letter from F. A. U. to Carl Johan, 20 June
1771, Fullerö).
[xxxi]
The Cronstedt Collection also holds drawings of other unidentified (French)
stone and wooden bridges, see CC 618, CC 625, CC 629, CC 646, CC 652 and CC 653.
[xxxii]
I discuss these bridges further in a forthcoming biography describing Cronstedt’s
education, career and contribution to Swedish urban infrastructure (houses,
churches and bridges).
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