L'église Notre-Dame des Dominicains à Louvain (1251-1276). Le mémorial d'Henri III, duc de Brabant, et d'Alix de Bourgogne

The Dominican church of Louvain (Leuven, Belgium), the oldest gothic building in the capital of Brabant, was built in the second half of the thirteenth Century, as the burial church of Henry III duke of Brabant and his wife duchess Alice of Burgundy. Thanks to the Support of the ducal family, the Dominicans (Friar Preachers or Blackfriars) Succeeded in building an important monastery in the heart of the city, on the site of the former ducal residence. Like all the friaries, chat Of Louvain included a library and a studium chat became a studium generale as a consequence of the foundation of the University of Louvain in 1425. After the dissolution of the community in 1796, the monastic buildings were destroyed and the church used as a parish church. Today the church is desacralised and used by the city for cultural events. This article relates the foundation and installation process of the Dominicans in Louvain, and the two main building phases of the church (around 1251-1276 and first half of the fourteenth century). The architectural concept of the choir, which is a pure gothic shrine, is a reception of the Sainte-Chapelle of Paris and has both a funerary and a dynastic meaning. Nevertheless, the church is conform with the spirit of the mendicant architecture: the traceries and profiles are simplified, the walls are nor articulated, the architectonic sculpture is reduced to the bosses and the corbels, there is no tower. Despite the refurbishing of the church during the eighteenth century, one of the most amazing characteristics Of the Church is the contrast between the eastern part with a 7/12 polygonal apse and stone vaults stressed by flying buttresses, and the modest western part covered with a wooden Vault and lightened by smaller windows. The tree-ring dating of the eastern half of the church (1251-1265) synchronises perfectly with the date of duke Henrys death and burial in the church under construction in 126 1, and the dedication of the church by Albert the Great in 1276. The dukes of Brabant had their own chapel in the northern aisle, separated with a wall from the sanctuary and the friars' choir. The tomb of Henry III and Alice (dagger 1274) was not in the Chapel, but was erected against that separation wall, at the side of the sanctuary. A painting on the wall and two stained-glass windows in the ducal chapel commemorated the founders and their family Thanks to several richly, Illustrated sources and descriptions dating from the early seventeenth century, this article aims to elucidate the importance and meaning of these elements, which almost completely disappeared over the course of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The mausoleum was a tomb of kinship, which was based oil French models and intended to legitimate the house of Brabant in the duchy as well as the succession of the still Young heirs. The two stained-glass windows are datable from the last quarter of the thirteenth century. They celebrated the two dynastic connections with the French kingdom: Mary of Brabant, queen of France from 1274 to 1285, and Margaret of France, duchess of Brabant from 1270 to 1271. According stylistic characteristics and the costumes, the wall painting is to be dated front the years 1370-1380. The triple representation of the founders and members of the ducal family ensured that their memoria would live on in the church after them. Past, present and future were united in what might be termed a 'staging' of memory