Tradition and Innovation: The Case of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Wooden Bridges

Abstract

A synopsis of the wooden bridges carried out in the second part of the eighteenth century would be hard to construct, as it would necessarily result much fragmented and incomplete. In that period, a sign of the need for renewing the criteria and rules of design may be perceived in the Traité des ponts by Henri Gautier. The state of knowledge at that time is well testified by the Encyclopédie of Diderot and D’Alembert, which had a primary role in characterizing the culture at that time. An extended research at the Fonds Ancien of the École des Ponts et Chaussées has led to identify a particularly significant manuscript, dated 1793, in which the beginning of a new approach to design is clearly evident. The very meaningful story of the Concours de pont within the Concours d’architecture at the École des Ponts et Chaussées is thus addressed. The cultural institutions of the period played a key role in generating and disseminating knowledge in a variety of forms. The Académie Royale des Sciences, intrigued by the accomplishments of the wooden bridges designed by the Grubenmann brothers created the opportunity to obtain a copy of the drawings and drew up a report of the bridge of Schaffhausen. Finally, some works by Karl Friedrick von Wiebeking are presented in this chapter.

E ancora che la natura cominci dalla ragione e termini nella sperienza, a noi bisogna seguire il contrario, cioè cominciando […] dalla sperienza, e con quella investicare la ragione. Leonardo, Ms 55 recto