What materials were used to make stained glass windows?
I am doing a paper on the stained glass windows in the Chartres Cathedral in France. Does anyone know what methods and materials were used in making the glass windows?
At that time all windows were framed using cast lead came which is an H shaped lead strip that takes the glass in the two channels and which is cut to fit and soldered when two pieces meet. Ordinary windows were rather small panes often in diamond shape. Church windows were made of poured and rolled cast glass or glass blown in a cylinder and cut open while it was hot. These sheets of glass were cut to shapes to make the design as is still done today. In addition, and much less done today, transparent glass with some color was painted with silver solutions and fired which drove the silver into to the glass and turned it various shades of amber and brown allowing images of faces and hands - this is the origin of the term stained glass - not the color.
The glass panels were generally set in the stone work, sometimes in wood in the stone work. The glass and stone work was done by craftsmen who traveled from cathedral to cathedral to castle and lived on the site during their phase of construction.