A fan vault is a form of vault used in the Gothic style, in which the ribs are all of the same curve and spaced equidistantly, in a manner resembling a fan. The initiation and propagation of this design element is strongly associated with

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. The earliest example, dating from about the year 1351, may be seen in the cloisters of Gloucester Cathedral. The largest fan vault in the world can be found in King's College Chapel, Cambridge. The fan vault is peculiar to England. The lierne vault of the cathedral of Barbastro in northern Spain closely resembles a fan vault, but it does not form a perfect conoid. Harvey (1978) suggests

Catherine of Aragon Catherine of Aragon (also spelt as Katherine, ; 16 December 1485 – 7 January 1536) was Queen of England as the first wife of King Henry VIII from their marriage on 11 June 1509 until their annulment on 23 May 1533. She was previously ...

as a possible source of English influence in

Aragon Aragon ( , ; Spanish and an, Aragón ; ca, Aragó ) is an autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. In northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces (from north to so ...

Birth of the fan vault

The fan vault is attributed to development in Gloucester between 1351 and 1377, with the earliest known surviving example being the east cloister walk of Gloucester Cathedral. Harvey (1978) hypothesises that the east cloister at Gloucester was finished under Thomas de Cantebrugge from the

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depi ...

Cambridge, Gloucestershire Cambridge ( ) is a hamlet in the district of Stroud, in the county of Gloucestershire, England. It lies on the A38 road between Bristol and Gloucester. It is about 3 miles (5 km) from Dursley and about 11 miles (18 km) from Gloucester. ...

, who left in 1364 to work on the

chapter house A chapter house or chapterhouse is a building or room that is part of a cathedral, monastery or collegiate church in which meetings are held. When attached to a cathedral, the cathedral chapter meets there. In monasteries, the whole commu ...

at Hereford Cathedral (also thought to have been fan vaulted on the basis of a drawing by William Stukeley). The other three parts of the cloister at Gloucester were begun in 1381, possibly under Robert Lesyngham. Other examples of early fan vaults exist around Gloucester, implying the activity of several 14th century master masons in that region.

Structure

The ribs of a fan vault are of equal curvature and rotated at equal distances around a central (vertical) axis, forming the conoid shape which gives rise to the name. In between sequences of conoids, flat central spandrels fill the space. According to Leedy (1980), the fan vault was developed in England (as opposed to France and other centres of

Gothic architecture Gothic architecture (or pointed architecture) is an architectural style that was prevalent in Europe from the late 12th to the 16th century, during the High and Late Middle Ages, surviving into the 17th and 18th centuries in some areas. I ...

) due to the manner in which English rib vaults were normally constructed. In an English rib vault, the courses are laid perpendicular to the ''rib'' while in France they are laid perpendicular to the wall.

Buildings with fan vaulting

Medieval and Early Modern

* Gloucester Cathedral, cloisters, earliest fan vaulting begun 1373 by Abbot Horton * King's College Chapel, Cambridge, the world's largest fan vault (1512–1515) * Bath Abbey, Somerset, nave and chancel (1860s restoration; originally by William Vertue) * Brasenose College, Oxford, Chapel ceiling – a spectacular example of plaster pendant fan vaulting * Canterbury Cathedral, crossing tower by John Wastell, Henry VI's chantry chapel * Christ Church, Oxford, staircase to the great hall * Church of St Andrew, Mells, Somerset, porch *

Church of St John the Baptist, Axbridge The Church of St John the Baptist in Axbridge, Somerset, England, was built in the 13th century and has been designated as a grade I listed building. Work on the current building began in the early 15th century, and grew from an earlier building ...

, Somerset, crossing * Church of St Peter and St Paul, Muchelney, Somerset, under the tower * Church of St. John the Baptist, Cirencester, Gloucestershire, porch and north chapel * Collegiate Church of St Mary, Warwick, Dean's Chapel *

Convocation House Convocation House is the lower floor of the 1634–1637 westward addition to the University of Oxford's Bodleian Library and Divinity School in Oxford, England. It adjoins the Divinity School, which pre-dates it by just over two hundred years, ...

, Oxford * Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, main gateway *

Ely Cathedral Ely Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, is an Anglican cathedral in the city of Ely, Cambridgeshire, England. The cathedral has its origins in AD 672 when St Etheldreda built an abbey church. The prese ...

, Bishop Alcock's chantry chapel * Eton College Chapel (the vault dates from 1958) * Hampton Court Palace, Great Gate and oriel window in the Great Hall * Henry VII's Lady Chapel,

Westminster Abbey Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the United ...

, London, 1503–1509 (with pendants, by William Vertue) * Lincoln's Inn Chapel, undercroft *

Manchester Cathedral Manchester Cathedral, formally the Cathedral and Collegiate Church of St Mary, St Denys and St George, in Manchester, England, is the mother church of the Anglican Diocese of Manchester, seat of the Bishop of Manchester and the c ...

, under the tower *

Milton Abbey Milton Abbey school is an independent school for day and boarding pupils in the village of Milton Abbas, near Blandford Forum in Dorset, in South West England. It has 224 pupils , in five houses: Athelstan, Damer, Hambro, Hodgkinson and Tregonw ...

, Dorset, crossing (by William Smyth) * Peterborough Cathedral, Cambridgeshire, retrochoir *Red Mount Chapel, King's Lynn * Sherborne Abbey, Dorset, quire c. 1430, nave c. 1490 (by William Smyth) *St Andrew's Church, Cullompton, Devon, south aisle * St Bartholomew's Church, Tong, Shropshire, chantry chapel * St David's Cathedral, Wales, Trinity Chapel * St Mary Aldermary, London (by

Christopher Wren Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 churc ...

) * St Mary's Church, North Leigh, Oxfordshire, Wilcote chantry chapel *St Mary's Church, Ottery St Mary, Devon, aisle *St Stephen's

cloister A cloister (from Latin ''claustrum'', "enclosure") is a covered walk, open gallery, or open arcade running along the walls of buildings and forming a quadrangle or garth. The attachment of a cloister to a cathedral or church, commonly against ...

at the

Palace of Westminster The Palace of Westminster serves as the meeting place for both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Informally known as the Houses of Parliament, the Palace lies on the north bank ...

(1529) *

St. George's Chapel, Windsor St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle in England is a castle chapel built in the late-medieval Perpendicular Gothic style. It is both a Royal Peculiar (a church under the direct jurisdiction of the monarch) and the Chapel of the Order of the Gart ...

, crossing, Urswick chantry chapel * Tewkesbury Abbey, cloister (only one bay remains) * University College, Oxford, gatehouse vaults * University Church of St Mary the Virgin, Oxford, porch * Wells Cathedral, crossing (by William Smyth) * Winchester Cathedral, Beaufort and Waynflete chantry chapels *St. Mary’s Church, Putney, Bishop West chapel

Gothic Revival

* Centre Block, Parliament of Canada,

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Eastnor Castle Eastnor Castle, Eastnor, Herefordshire, is a 19th-century mock castle. Eastnor was built for John Cocks, 1st Earl Somers, who employed Robert Smirke, later the main architect of the British Museum. The castle was built between 1811 and 1820 ...

, drawing room * Grand Theatre,

Leeds Leeds () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the thi ...

* Harkness Tower,

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

, New Haven, Connecticut, USHarkness Tower Memorial Hall
/ref> *

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster ...

lobbies, committee staircase, in the

John Rylands Library The John Rylands Research Institute and Library is a late-Victorian neo-Gothic building on Deansgate in Manchester, England. It is part of the University of Manchester. The library, which opened to the public in 1900, was founded by Enriqu ...

, baconcy, Manchester * Middlesex Guildhall, Westminster * Palau de la Música Catalana, Barcelona * Basilica Minore de San Sebastián, Manila, Philippines * St John's,

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

* St Mary's Church, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire * Saint Patrick's Church, New Orleans, Louisiana, US (apsidal fan vault) *

Strawberry Hill Strawberry Hill may refer to: United Kingdom *Strawberry Hill, London, England **Strawberry Hill House, Horace Walpole's Gothic revival villa **Strawberry Hill railway station United States *Strawberry Hill (San Francisco), California *Strawberry ...

, Twickenham, London * Unitarian Church in Charleston, South Carolina, US *

Washington National Cathedral The Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul in the City and Diocese of Washington, commonly known as Washington National Cathedral, is an American cathedral of the Episcopal Church. The cathedral is located in Washington, D.C., the ca ...

, Washington, DC, US (Children's Chapel) * Wills Memorial Building, University of Bristol *

Cathedral Basilica of Christ the King The Cathedral Basilica of Christ the King is a Roman Catholic church in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The cathedral was consecrated on December 19, 1933. It is the seat of the Bishop of the Diocese of Hamilton, and the cathedral of the Diocese o ...

, Hamilton, Ontario

References