page_title: Southern French Gothic
section_title: Brick construction
hierarchical_section_title: Southern French Gothic / Characteristics / Brick construction
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Arc en mitre, clocher des Jacobins, Toulouse, France. Illustration du Dictionnaire de Viollet-le-Duc.
context_page_description: Southern French Gothic is a specific and militant style of Gothic architecture developed in the South of France, especially in the Toulouse region. It arose in the early 13th century following the victory of the Catholic church over the Cathars, as the church sought to re-establish its authority in the region. As a result, church buildings typically present features drawn from military architecture. Taking into account the Cathars' criticism of the Catholic Church, Southern French Gothic is simpler and less ornate than northern French Gothic, and further differs in that the construction material is typically brick rather than stone. Over time, the style came to influence secular buildings as well as churches and spread beyond the area where Catharism had flourished.
context_section_description: In an area poor in stone, the typical construction material was brick, whose use in the Southern French Gothic of the regions of Toulouse, Montauban and Albi became one of its distinguishing marks. The builders used techniques adapted to this material, such as the miter arches typical of this style. Brick lends itself to geometric decorative compositions, and consequently, there are few sculptures integrated into the architecture. Depending on the type of clay used, the bricks can be molded or rounded by abrasion. Some buildings use stone sparingly to create color contrasts.
  Neighboring regions were coming under this influence but dominated by stone construction often adopted the same architectural vocabulary.
caption: Bell Tower of the Jacobins of Toulouse, illustration from the  Dictionary  of Viollet-le-Duc
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "600", "Image YResolution": "600", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2009:07:23 23:56:32", "Image ExifOffset": "164", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "302", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6653", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2401", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3344"}