The importance of historical documents for the study of stability in ancient buildings: the French Panthèon case study

The recent studies on the stability of the French Panthéon [1], commissioned by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, enabled to spot the causes of the structural disorders, thanks to a balanced fusion of historical analysis, precision surveys, experimental inspections and numerical modelling. The interest in these studies arouses also from the fact that the French Panthéon, designed by Soufflot with slender structures and innovative techniques and finished by Rondelet in 1790, can be considered as the first building for whom tests on materials and “modern” structural calculations have been carried out in a systematic manner.