Throughout high school, I spent my days sitting in French class dreaming about traveling to France and appreciating all the wonderful sights and history that the country has to offer the world. I dove into heavy research on all the landmarks and areas I wanted to make sure that I saw when I one day made my way over to the beautiful land. I had always had fascinations about the Eiffel Tower, The Louvre, and The Arc de Triumph, but one place that I knew I had always wanted to make sure I visited was the beautiful and most famous Cathedral, Notre Dame Cathedral.
This beautiful place is known for its wonderful Gothic architecture, as well as all of the histories that occurred here. Being the history nerd that I am, it meant a lot to me to make it here one day. Unfortunately, on Monday, April 15th at around 6:50 p.m., a fire began right under the spire of the building. This fire spread pretty quickly because by 7:40 PM the spire was engulfed in flames and by 8:07 p.m. the spire and the roof above the high alter collapsed leaving damage to the high altar as well. Luckily, many of the artifacts and relics that were inside the building were saved as well as the 16 copper statues that stand around the spire, which were removed earlier in the restoration efforts. However, this horrid disaster destroyed the roof, which as experts are saying, cannot be replicated and rebuild in the same way and fashion as before. This roof spanned 330 feet and was one of the oldest of its kind still in Paris. Luckily, the rose windows were saved from the fire and retain their 13th-century glass structure.
The history of Notre Dame will always live on, in thought. Henry VI was crowned king in the cathedral in 1431, which was the start of his rule. During the time of the French Revolution, when the Cathedral was somewhat abandoned and began to deteriorate, Napoleon Bonaparte decided it was his job to save the beautiful building. This effort went on for many years and took a restoration process where two architects redid the spire and the flying buttresses that make it so famous for its Gothic design. My favorite historical fact, however, is one concerning Joan of Arc. Joan of Arc was a powerful fighter and leader, who was a woman and at the time, this was unheard of. She said she had a special connection and communication with God and this is the path he told her to take. Fast forward through the story, and Joan of Arc ended up being burned at the stake. It was later at the Notre Dame Cathedral that Joan of Arc was beatified, which mean that she made her crossing over into heaven.
I find this deep history so interesting and so important, it breaks my heart entirely that I never got the chance to see the original building that it happened in.
I hope one day to still travel to France and see what is left and feel the historical grounds and history they hold course through my body as I stand on the same ground they did. The building may not be the same, but there are things that we can do to remember what it once was. I feel we should take this as a wake-up call to travel and experience before the time to late to see what we want and to experience what history holds for us to discover.
