Thuret Priory Church
The former priory church of Saint-Limin (or Saint Martin) in Thuret is now the parish church of the town in Limagne, which has almost 800 inhabitants . The building has been classified as a Monument historique since 1850 .
Building history
The church was probably built in the late 11th century (nave) and redesigned in the second half of the 12th century (around 1150/1170) (renovation of the transept and choir area ). In the 15th century, the central nave was given a ribbed vault instead of the original barrel vault . During the time of the French Revolution - perhaps even before that - the monastery buildings on the south side of the church ( cloister , dormitory , refectory, etc.) were demolished; the church building itself has been used as a parish church since then . Around the middle of the 19th century the building was completely restored; The Vierungsturm , which collapsed during the revolutionary years, was also reconstructed - in Romanesque styles , but with a different stone material. It is not known whether parts of the interior of the church were originally decorated with frescoes; the decorative paintings visible today probably only date from the 19th century.
Patronage
The patronage has changed several times over the centuries - a fact that is unusual for a church in this form: originally the church was consecrated to St-Genès, followed by a consecration to St-Limin in 1311, and to St-Limin in the 18th century. Martin, in the 19th century at St-Bonnet and in the 20th century at St- Bénilde . Several of these terms are still in circulation today.
Building
Stones
The church is almost entirely made of light-colored limestone , which was quarried in the Chaptuzat quarries located about 10 kilometers to the northwest . With the exception of the facade, the buttresses and parts of the central apse, the stones are only roughly hewn. The bell storey of the crossing tower, reconstructed in the 19th century, consists of the dark volcanic lava rock of the Auvergne .
Layout
The church has a basilica floor plan (raised central nave and two side aisles ), which is interrupted by a transept in front of the choir area . The transept is slightly lower on the outside than the central nave and only protrudes a little beyond the outer walls of the aisles. The choir area is made up of three apses, so it has no ambulatory choir, which means that the church was not originally designed as a pilgrimage or pilgrimage church .
Elevation
The outline is also clearly designed and almost strict - architectural subtleties and figurative or ornamental building decorations are largely dispensed with on the exterior. Only the yoke structure of the church interior is indicated on the outside by buttresses . The ( immaculate ) windows are small; only the west window above the main portal and the transept windows are somewhat larger. The eaves rest on small stone consoles , some of which are sculpted (acrobat, grimace cutter, winged mermaid, animal with a ball in its mouth).
The view of the choir with its three apses, the middle of which is slightly larger than the two on the side, is very nice; it is also more accentuated by half-column templates. An octagonal two-storey crossing tower rises above the crossing with window windows in the lower area and a ring of sound openings above, made of volcanic rock but interrupted by limestone columns, which, however, was only added in its current form in the 19th century.
inner space
The yokes in the nave of the church have four-part ribbed vaults, which, however, do not correspond to the original state, but replaced the older barrel vault in the 15th century . In the side aisles, however, the original barrel vaults have been preserved. The upper part of the building rests on pillars with half-columns in front of them. The crossing area shows a cross bar ( massif barlong ) which is common for Auvergnatian church buildings , but which is not fully worked out here.
The half-columns have a total of 64 simply carved and partly colored capitals , several of which were restored or supplemented in the 19th century. The figure style is so unique, however, that most of the figurative capitals are attributed to the Middle Ages - there are depictions of Adam and Eve , a good shepherd , birds drinking from a goblet, a tethered monkey, etc. a.
Portals
The church has two portals. The west portal, reserved for lay brothers / conversers , pilgrims and villagers, is largely unadorned; only the two capitals, on which a simple archivolt arch rests, show figurative decorations (atlases, people in vines, birds).
The south portal, on the other hand, which was originally reserved for monks only as access from the cloister area to the church, shows a rather rare gable-shaped tympanum with Christ as Pantocrator sitting on a throne in a mandorla , which is laterally supported by two angels (according to the inscription below, the Archangel Michael and Gabriel ) is held. The dressing of the garments of the three persons, which consists mostly of concentric semicircles, is in no way realistic - the folds are meant to be purely decorative. Holes can be seen on Christ's chest and in his cross nimbus , which suggest that precious (precious) stones were once embedded here. A tree of life can be seen on the side of the two angels, which are exceptionally nimbly . The two capitals have an abstract vegetal decor; the right shows a beautiful block frieze as a conclusion.
meaning
The style of the figural jewelry - which can only be found in Thuret and probably only created by one or two sculptors of the late 11th century - is extremely simple and naive, almost 'primitive': the body treatment is non-plastic, the arms of the figures are often significantly elongated and the faces appear stereotypical. Nevertheless, the overall expression of the tympanum and the capitals is quite powerful and representative.
Black Madonna
Inside the church there is a Black Madonna from the 17th century, venerated in the region . The baby Jesus does not sit - as usual - on her lap ( sedes sapientiae ), but curiously, his head looks out from the front through an opening in the bell-shaped Mary's mantle covered with gold leaf.
literature
- Caroline Roux: L'église priorale Saint-Genès de Thuret . Sparsae hors-série N ° 1, Aigueperse 2003, ISSN 0763-0190 .
- Caroline Roux: Les chapiteaux de l'église de Thuret, un ensemble atypique en Basse-Auvergne? in: Revue d'Auvergne , T. 562, Actes du colloque Le chapiteau à l'époque romane , Issoire, 13. – 15. November 1998, 2002, pp. 12-29
Web links
- Église St-Limin (or St-Martin) - Photos and brief information (Engl.)
- Thuret Photos
- Église St-Benilde - Photos and brief information (Engl.)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Église Saint Limin (ou Saint Martin), Thuret in the Base Mérimée of the French Ministry of Culture (French)
Coordinates: 45 ° 58 ′ 13 ″ N , 3 ° 15 ′ 27 ″ E