Early Christian and Romanesque Architecture: France

Even before the evacuation of France by the Roman legions at the beginning of the 5th century AD, a large number of Christian churches had been erected, partly owing to the energy of St Martin of Tours (about AD 316-400); but nothing substantial remains of any of them, not even of the large church built to his memory at Tours in 472, or of other large churches at Lyons and Clermont. However, a number of baptisteries survive from the early Christian period, for example at Fréjus, Meaux, Aix, and Marseille. The oldest surviving church in France, much altered since its erection in 682-96, seems to be the ‘Temple of St Jean’ at Poitiers, a small rectangular building with apses, incorporating a Gallo-Roman baptistery. The crypt of Jouarre near Meaux was part of a contemporary church.

The next example, after a further long interval of time, is the small church at Germigny des Pres (about 810), which has a Byzantine Greek cross plan, and Islamic details. There are a few other Carolingian churches: at St Philbert de Grandlieu (about 819, but much altered since), St Martin at Angers, etc., but Romanesque architecture proper in France does not begin till around 981 with the rebuilding of Cluny Abbey as the centre of an influential monastic reform. Examples from the 11th century include the vaulted crypt of St Benigne at Dijon (1001), St Hilaire at Poitiers (1018-59), St Front and St Etienne at Perigueux (1047), Jumieges (about 1040-60), the Abbaye aux Dames and the Abbaye aux Hommes at Caen (1066), St Sernin at Toulouse (finished 1099), Sainte Foy at Conques, the later (third) abbey of Cluny (1088-1131), Vezelay (1089-1140), and Notre Dame du Port at Clermont.

For French architecture of later periods, see Gothic architecture: France and French architecture. See also Roman architecture, ancient.