This opposition, or rather this tension-limit between
I the two kinds of science—nomad, war-machine science
and royal, State science—reappears at different moments,
on different levels. The work of Anne Querrien enables us
to identify two of these moments; one is the construction
of Gothic cathedrals in the twelfth century, the other the
construction of bridges in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries." Gothic architecture is indeed inseparable
from a will to build churches longer and taller than the
Romanesque churches. Ever farther, ever higher ... But
this difference is not simply quantitative, it marks a
"Ibe War Machine
qualitative change: the static relation, form-matter, tends
to fade into the background in favor of a dynamic
relation, material-forces. It is the cutting of the stone that
turns it into material capable of holding and coordinating
forces of thrust, and of constructing ever higher and
longer vaults. 1 he vault is no longer a form, but the line of
continuous variation of the stones. It is as if Gothic
conquered a smooth space, while Romanesque remained
partially within a striated space (where the vault depends
on the juxtaposition of parallel pillars). But stone-cutting
is inseparable from on the one hand a plane of projection
at ground level, which functions as a plane limit, and on
the other hand a series of successive approximations
(squaring), or variable shapings of voluminous stones. Of
course, it was to the theorematic science of Euclid that
one turned in order to find a foundation for the enter-
prise: mathematical figures and equations were thought
to be the intelligible form capable of organizing surfaces
and volumes.
