What are the highest and biggest half-timbered buildings built during medieval era?
score:14
While it is possible for a wooden building to exceed 200 feet (approx. 61 metres) in height (see, for example, Pagoda of Fogong Temple from 1056) there is nothing approaching this height from medieval Europe still standing. 5 or 6 floors seems to have been the limit, with two to four-storey buildings common depending on the city and the century.
Highest / Biggest
Many of the tallest medieval half-timbered houses still standing are found in Germany and France. In some cases, though, only the foundations or ground floor date from medieval times - these have been excluded from the images below.
Webergasse 8b, Esslingen am Neckar (1266-67). According to this article, "the entire core construction is still preserved, that is, the beams made of oak wood are around 750 years old." Image source.
Nos. 11 & 13 rue Francois Miron are believed to be the oldest houses in Paris. "Sources indicate that they could have been built as early as the 14th century." The frame type suggests they were built before the 1450s as this style had gone out of use by then. Image source.
Hafenmarkt 4-10, Esslingen am Neckar. Dendrochronology shows that this building dates from between 1328 and 1331. Image source.
Based on the evidence of structures built before 1453 which are still standing, 5 floors (6 if one includes attic rooms) was the limit for half-timber buildings. If we assume an average of around 10 feet per floor (including construction between floors), this gives us a total height of up to 50 feet, though some upper floors were usually less.
Finally, the Maison d'Adam in Angers (France), built shortly after 1491, falls a little outside your time-frame but it is 15th century and impressive enough to merit a mention (and a picture):
Average number of floors
This is difficult to answer as it depended on where, when and how wealthy. However, the chronicler Matthew Paris notes that, on a visit to Paris in 1254, King Henry III of England
was much struck with `the elegance of the houses which were made of plaster, and were threechambered and even of four or more stories (stationum)'
Cited in L. F. Salzman, Building in England Down to 1540
the king 'was struck' because in London at that time, town houses were usually only two storeys. However,
by the late thirteenth century there were houses in Cheapside of three storeys plus a garret.
Source: D. M. Palliser (ed), The Cambridge Urban History of Britain: volume I, 600-1540
Also, in London, in
About 1300 it was thought that houses in the city commonly had two or three storeys over a cellar and were divided into several units of occupation.
Source: D. M. Palliser (ed)
Upvote:-2
Timber framed buildings cannot go above three floors (about 50 feet) because beyond that they cannot hold up their own weight. Often buildings would be constructed with the first or second floor made of masonry and then wooden floors above. The "average" number of floors in the middle of a city during the Renaissance would be two. Here is Dürer's "St. Anthony in the City" (1513) showing the typical Renaissance/Tudor view of a metropolis.
More post
- 📝 Why did the Hungarians protest and react so much about Khrushchevs secret speech?
- 📝 Did the "ancients" use lead plates to prevent pain in their knees?
- 📝 What is the contemporary knowledge of the theoretical history?
- 📝 What was going to be Hitler's next plan after taking Russia?
- 📝 Alternatives to a Two State Solution
- 📝 When did the Romans finally acknowledge that they were living in an empire?
- 📝 What kind of law courts existed in first-century Palestine?
- 📝 How did the US abolition of slavery affect the cotton exports?
- 📝 Where can I find an English translation of 'Il Fioretto della Bibbia'?
- 📝 What was the role of the college of consuls in Ancient Rome?
- 📝 What is the most number of times someone has become leader of a European country?
- 📝 Were there any Senate hearings involved in ending WW I trench warfare?
- 📝 Why did Kennedy refuse any military action in Laos at first and then decide otherwise by sending combat troops?
- 📝 Were there cases of bride kidnapping in the medieval period?
- 📝 Where did the South Dublin/"D4" accent come from?
- 📝 When did prostitution become illegal in the United States and why?
- 📝 How hard was it to produce German zeppelin pilots in World War One?
- 📝 Whom did Vernon Jordan help secure affirmative-action jobs in the (pre-)Clinton White House?
- 📝 Was the M4 Sherman used frequently in artillery capacity?
- 📝 Was there any treaty during WWI and II with the world countries and Sir Henry Dunant's Red Cross to respect those with Red Cross?
- 📝 Which specific day of 1964 was the tree Prometheus (WPN-114) cut down?
- 📝 What were the most common reasons why draft-age men were not conscripted for the Union Army?
- 📝 Does somebody know anything about the original "Tour de Croy" tower?
- 📝 Who was the sitter for John Everett Millais's painting "The Somnambulist"?
- 📝 Were any works completely lost during the Nazi book burnings?
- 📝 When did people first started to consider lead poisoning as a possible problem?
- 📝 Is there a Russian Black Legend? (a dispute about the morality of Russia's colonial expansion)
- 📝 Looking for information on North Korean government/party/military organization late 1980s-early 2000s
- 📝 Why does the amount of days in an year on average of the Gregorian calendar only have 4 decimal places (365.2425)?
- 📝 Did the Eastern Romans also use Roman concrete?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 What are the highest and biggest half-timbered buildings built during medieval era?
- 📝 Why are the buildings built in classical style in the first half of the 19th century in Russia so frequently yellow-and-white - coloured?
- 📝 What is the date and original source of this medieval picture?
- 📝 What are the text and subtext of this 1949 Soviet cartoon?
- 📝 Who are the three men standing and what are they holding at this University of Paris Doctors' Meeting?
- 📝 Why are most of the world's oldest buildings in Europe and not in the Fertile Crescent?
- 📝 What goods did Germany trade during the Weimar Republic, and with whom?
- 📝 What are the historical reasons for religious and political negative attitudes towards h*m*sexuality?
- 📝 What changes happened in law enforcement and criminal trials during the Nazi era in Germany?
- 📝 What are the origins of knife and fork language etiquette?
- 📝 What did European people of the 5th century AD eat during spring and what was the availability?
- 📝 What are these hats and the function of those wearing them (worn by the Russian imperial army at Borodino)?
- 📝 What were the operating principles of Japan's MITI during the 1950s and 60s?
- 📝 What is the source of "the three most useless things in the world are the Great Wall, Pyramids, and the Yamato"?
- 📝 What were Chiang Kai-shek's biggest strategic blunders during the Second Sino-Japanese war?
- 📝 Are there any remaining existant texts that describe the styles and techniques of Medieval European swordsmanship?
- 📝 What happened to all the scholars and scientists of Western Rome during the barbarian invasions?
- 📝 What are the red and white sectors of The Tower of Babel (Rotterdam)?
- 📝 What was the border regime between Poland and Czechoslovakia like during the 1970s and 1980s?
- 📝 What evidence is there of Asians and Africans in medieval Britain other than Moors in the 7th century?
- 📝 What demographic of people were the Ford Motor's Company biggest customers during the car boom of the early twentieth Century?
- 📝 What are the grenades and artillery cited in this testimony?
- 📝 What is the best way to describe the form of Japanese government during the years before and during world war 2?
- 📝 What was the currency in use in Palestine shortly before and during WWI?
- 📝 What are the modern roles of brigadier generals and commodores?
- 📝 What were conditions like for Chinese men subject to recruitment by the army during the Second Sino-Japanese War and Chinese Civil War?
- 📝 During the Battle of Britain, what AA defenses were available, and where?
- 📝 What were the legal and societal conditions concerning "interracial love" during 1870s?
- 📝 What criteria are used to determine the popularity of Medieval European rulers?
- 📝 The Penny Wedding - what are the items in the bottom right corner and why are they there?