Question Author
tonyV /Centuries old dry oak would catch fire pretty quickly even with a discarded cigarette /
I will bet you a large sum can't set fire to a beam with a cigarette.
btw, Dry oak of 20 years has the same water content of dry oak of 600 years, dry is dry, you can't get drier.
naomi; As I understand it, the architect, Viollet-le-Duc -who restored Notre Dame in the 1840s- employed the best stone-sculptor of the day, Geoffroy-Dechaume, to carve some figures, (and his masons carved the famous gargoyle-monsters). I believe a film was made shortly before the fire, of Geoffroy-Dechaume's figures being lifted off before restoration work was to begin.
This might be what you have read?