The Ox Hides

While we look at the cathedral from this side perspective, you might notice something a little unusual: there is only one tower. For a cathedral this grand, that feels like an unfinished thought. And in a way, it is.

During construction, the builders ran into a serious problem. A deep pit on the site kept filling with water, no matter what they tried. Work stalled, panic set in, and the project was going nowhere. Then a simple bricklayer stepped forward with a solution: lay ox hides across the ground to seal the water out. It worked beautifully. But there was a catch. His young son had overheard the plan and quietly told the master builder, who used the idea without paying the bricklayer a single coin.

When the bricklayer discovered what his son had done, his fury was absolute. He killed the boy. His wife, unable to live with the grief, drowned herself. The bricklayer disappeared, and no one ever saw him again.

The builders, shaken to the core by the tragedy, never dared to add that second tower. Guilt, it seems, is a surprisingly effective architectural constraint.