What went up in smoke at Notre-Dame de Paris on 15 April 2019 was its spire and most of the enrichments made by Viollet-le-Duc during twenty years of work, from 1845 to 1865. This volume gathers the plates made during the last quarter of the nineteenth century by Médéric Mieusement (1840-1905). They now constitute a documentary treasure held at the Médiathèque du Patrimoine et de la Photographie, in wide demand among today's restorers. A study by Isabelle Gui completes an album made from original prints in that collection.

Mieusement was the great recorder of French cathedrals in the nineteenth century. Armed with his 30 x 40 cm camera and his glass plates, he travelled across the country for the former Directorate of Religious Affairs to draw up an inventory of the monuments that form the basis of much of French heritage. He knew how to find the best viewpoints, from inviting himself to a neighbour's window to standing on a roof and even building imposing scaffolding.