Symmetry of Forms and Structures

Wrocław-Cracow, 2009

SHELL IN THE GERMAN BAROQUE:

GEOMETRY IS TECHNOLOGY

VÍCTOR COMPÁN, MARGARITA CÁMARA AND FÉLIX ESCRIG

Name: Víctor Compán Cardiel, Architect (Spain, 1972).

Address: Department of Continuum Mechanics and Structural Analysis. University of Seville. Avda. Reina
Mercedes nº 2, Seville 41012, Spain.
E-mail: compan@us.es; Home-page: www.mmc.us.es
Fields of interest: Geometry, Structural behavior
Awards:
Publications: STREMAH 2003, STREMAH 2009, Heritage 2008, World Heritage and Sustainable
Development . VI Congress of History Construction 2009

Name: Margarita Cámara Pérez, Architect (Spain, 1976)

Address: Department of Continuum Mechanics and Structural Analysis. University of Seville. Avda. Reina
Mercedes nº 2, Seville 41012, Spain.
E-mail: mcamara@us.es; Home-page: www.mmc.us.es
Fields of interest: Geometry, Structural behavior

Name: Felix Escrig Pallarés, Architect (Spain, 1950)

Address: Department of Continuum Mechanics and Structural Analysis. University of Seville. Avda. Reina
Mercedes nº 2, Seville 41012, Spain.
E-mail: felix@us.es; Home-page: www.mmc.us.es, http://starbooks.es
Fields of interest: Geometry, Structural behavior
Awards: Fulbrigth granted in Berkeley and full. Prof. of the School of Architecture of Seville. Among other
prices and distinctions Escrig has the IFAI Award 1995 in USA, the Tsuboy Award, the Pioneer Award of the
Space Research Centre of the University of Surrey, Alluprogecto first Prize and Instituto Construccion
Tubular first Price. Editor of Advances in Architecture for the WIT Press in Southampton. Editor of STAR
(Structural Architecture) in the University of Seville. Editor of "Textos de Arquitectura". He has patented
several models of structural interest”
Publications: Author of more than hundred technical papers, other twenty of popular science and seven
principal books. Recently he has published several books on Historical Buildings: “The Great Structures in
Architecture” by WIT and “La Modernidad del Gótico”. He is also a Novelist who has published recently
“The Goodness of Venice” in Spanish.

Abstract: Shells are forms that base their behaviour in their geometry. When in the
Baroque style some architects were impelled to build with short budgets and pour
technological advices they thought that the solution was in the geometry and not in the
materials. Architects as Borromini, Guarini, Vittone, were the masters who taught a
new young generation headed by Juvara, Fischer and the Dienzenhofer family.

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Their proposals in double curved single layer domes were really shells thinner than
never before were done. Spherical domes caps realised at this time were as thin as
twenty centimetres with or without ribs. Vaults composed by sectors of sphere and
cylinders composed a varied show of complex traces never seen after Muslim domes.
The complexity of Baroque domes has not be conveniently studied till now may be
because engineers think more in terms of mathematical analysis than in terms of
geometrical concepts.

1. HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION.
Works, treatises and studies made in the 17th and 18th centuries are very diverse and
extensive, mainly in subjects like Maths and Geometry, in which the main advances
about these matters were developed in France.
During the 17th Century, almost all this kind of subjects emerged, like Analytic
Geometry, by Rene Descartes (1596-1650). A great interest in developing of the
Conical Perspective emerged too, laying the foundations of Proyective Geometry,
whose fundamentals were introduced by Girard Desargues (1591-1661). But is Gaspard
Monge (1746-1818) who put all the developed mathematical theories into practice,
being considered the inventor of Descriptive Geometry.
The main treatises in Architecture and their theories are based in concepts which were
created by the great architects of the Italian Renaissance. Europe turned attention to
Italy as source of inspiration, consolidating the conceptual basis and developing it later
in each country. Some of these countries assumed these principles, like Germany, The
Czech Republic and Austria, but another ones, like France or England, rejected them
due to the influence of Louis XIV and the first school of architecture (Académie Royale
D’Architecture), founded by Colbert in 1671.
All the efforts developed during the 17th Century and the beginning of the 18th Century
are mainly based on the design in plan of plane elements, like the studies of conic
sections, cycloids and epicycloids. The first studies of quadratic intersections are made
by Amadeo Frézier (1692-1773).

2. ARCHITECTONICAL GEOMETRY.
The main advances about the construction of complex spatial geometries by an architect
began with Dientzenhofer Family, at the final of the 17th Century. They researched
quite a lot into the execution of roofs with double-curvature surfaces and their
intersections. In this research, the only way to check the results and their evolution was
through built works, due to the existence of very few documents with graphic data
about it.

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There are great examples in which we can see the attempts made on the subject and thus
understand the geometric evolution until its total definition: St. Joseph, in Obořiště
(1702); Sta Klara, in Cheb (1708); Sta Margaret, in Brĕnov (1709); or the Church in
Benedictine Convent in Banz, in Bad Staffelstein (1698), the most important of all of
them, by Johann Dientzenhofer.

Fig 1. Church in Benedictine Convent in Banz, in Bad Staffelstein (1698)

Fig 2. 3D Model of the roof of Church in Benedictine Convent in Banz(1698).

The work made by Dientzenhofer family was continued by the German architect
Balthasar Neumann. With him, the constructive solution evolves with the same
geometrical basis. We emphasize the Chapel in the Residence, in Würzburg (1710).

Fig 3. Interior of the Chapel in the Residence, in Würzburg (1710)

Fig 4. Plan and Section of the Chapel in the Residence, in Würzburg (1710)

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 Fig 5. Creation of the warped rib. Chapel in the Residence, in Würzburg.
To design the warped rib, Balthasar Neumann follows the guidelines set by
Dientzenhofer Family: he established first the ribs and then the surface of the roof,
adjusting it to the built edges. All the geometrical precision that is present in the plan of
the roof and the warped rib is lost in the definition of the surfaces.
The geometric resort used in the definition in plan of the domes is the oval. This
enables the definition of the warped rib in a so much easier way, because being this rib
created by the intersection of two cylinders: an horizontal cylinder with its axis in the
longitudinal direction and a second cylinder whose axis is vertical, the oval is used as
support for the construction of the vertical one.

References.
H.A.Meek, Guarino Guarini and his architecture. Yale University Press. 1988.
Christian Norberg-Schulz, Weltgeschichte Der Architektur, Spätbarock Und Rokoko. Deutche Erlags-anstalt
Stuttgart.1985.
Hans Zimmer , Die Dientzenhofer. Rosenheimer.
Wolf Hartmut Roidl, Die Kurvierten Sakralräume Des Christoph Dientzenhofer. Tuduv-Studien. 1995.
Milada Vilímková, Johannes Brucker. Dientzenhofer, Rosenheimer Verlagshaus. 1989.
Werner Müller, Von Guarino Guarini Bis Balthasar Neumann. Michael Imhof, Petersberg Verlag. 2002.
Wilfried Hansmann , Balthasar Neumann. Dumont. 1999.
R. Sedlmaier, R. Pfister, Die Fürstibischöfliche Residenz Zu Würzburg. München Verlegt Bei
GeorgMüller.1923.
Otto,Christin F, Space Into Light. The Churches Of Balthasar Neumann, Mit Press Series. 1979.
Samlung Eckert, Aus Balthasar Neumanns Baubüro. Mainfränkisches Museum.
Fanzl Ludwig, Balthasar Neumann, Dachwerke Seiner Landkirchen, Technischen Universität Berlin.

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