The archaeometallurgy of Notre Dame de Paris

Stapling Notre Dame back together Maxime L'Héritier has sliced up more than 500 historical metal artifacts over the course of his career. But the first time he cut into ironwork from Notre Dame de Paris, the famous medieval cathedral in the center of the City of Light, the moment was still special. L'Héritier, an associate professor of medieval history at the University of Paris 8 Vincennes-Saint-Denis , uses elemental analysis and other techniques to study the metals in historical buildings, a field of study called archaeometallurgy. L'Héritier's specialty is iron and lead in medieval construction, especially in Gothic structures, so he was eager to help with the restoration of the iconic French church , which was built between 1163 and 1260 and severely damaged when the roof caught fire in April 2019. The collapse of the roof revealed hundreds of iron staples holding stones together along the very top row