Says Bourassé: "The cathedral of St. Front at Périgueux is unique." Its foundation dates with certitude from between 1010 and 1047, and is therefore contemporary with that of St. Marc's at Venice – which it so greatly resembles – which was rebuilt after a fire between 977 and 1071.
The general effect of the interior is as impressive as it is unusual, with its lofty cupolas, its weighty and gross pillars, and its massive arches between the cupolas; all of which are purely constructive elements.
There are few really ornamental details, and such as exist are of a severe and unprogressive type, being merely reminiscent of the antique.
In its general plan, St. Front follows that of a Grecian cross, its twelve wall-faces crowned by continuous pediments. Eight massive pillars, whose functions are those of the later developed buttress, flank the extremities of the cross, and are crowned by pyramidal cupolas which, with the main roofing, combine to give that distinctive character to this unusual and "foreign" cathedral of mid-France.
St. Front, from whom the cathedral takes its name, became the first bishop of Périgueux when the see was founded in the second century.
VI
ST. PIERRE DE POITIERS
IN 1317 the diocese of Poitiers was divided, and parts apportioned to the newly founded bishoprics of Maillezais and Luçon. The first bishop of Poitiers was St. Nectaire, in the third century. By virtue of the Concordat of 1801 the diocese now comprehends the Departments of Vienne and Deux-Sèvres.
The cathedral of St. Pierre de Poitiers has been baldly and tersely described as a "mere Lombard shell with a Gothic porch." This hardly does it justice, even as to preciseness. The easterly portion is Lombard, without question, and the nave is of the northern pointed variety; a not unusual admixture of feature, but one which can but suggest that still more, much more, is behind it.
The pointed nave is of great beauty, and, in the westerly end, contains an elaborate rosace– an infrequent attribute in these parts.
The aisles are of great breadth, and are quite as lofty in proportion. This produces an effect of great amplitude, nearly as much so as of the great halled churches at Albi or the aisleless St. André at Bordeaux, and contrasts forcibly in majesty with the usual Gothic conception of great height, as against extreme width.
Of Poitiers Professor Freeman says: "It is no less a city of counts than Angers; and if Counts of Anjou grew into Kings of England, one Countess of Poitiers grew no less into a Queen of England; and when the young Henry took her to wife, he took all Poitou with her, and Aquitaine and Gascogne, too, so great was his desire for lands and power." Leaving that aspect apart – to the historians and apologists – it is the churches of Poitiers which have for the traveller the greatest and all-pervading interest.
Poitiers is justly famed for its noble and numerous mediæval church edifices. Five of them rank as a unique series of Romanesque types – the most precious in all France. In importance they are perhaps best ranked as follows: St. Hilaire, of the tenth and eleventh centuries; the Baptistère, or the Temple St. Jean, of the fourth to twelfth centuries; Notre Dame de la Grande and St. Radegonde, of the eleventh and twelfth centuries; and La Cathédrale, dating from the end of the Romanesque period. Together they present a unique series of magnificent churches, as is truly claimed.
When one crosses the Loire, he crosses the boundary not only into southern Gaul but into southern Europe as well; where the very aspects of life, as well as climatic and topographical conditions and features, are far different from those of the northern French provinces.
Looking backward from the Middle Ages – from the fourteenth century to the fourth – one finds the city less a city of counts than of bishops.
Another aspect which places Poitiers at the very head of ecclesiastical foundations is that it sustained, and still sustains, a separate religious edifice known as the Baptistère. It is here a structure of Christian-Roman times, and is a feature seldom seen north of the Alps, or even out of Italy. There is, however, another example at Le Puy and another at Aix-en-Provence. This Baptistère de St. Jean was founded during the reign of St. Hilaire as bishop of Poitiers, a prelate whose name still lives in the Église St. Hilaire-le-Grand.
The cathedral of St. Pierre is commonly classed under the generic style of Romanesque; more particularly it is of the Lombard variety, if such a distinction can be made between the two species with surety. At all events it marks the dividing-line – or period, when the process of evolution becomes most marked – between the almost pagan plan of many early Christian churches and the coming of Gothic.
In spite of its prominence and its beauty with regard to its accessories, St. Pierre de Poitiers does not immediately take rank as the most beautiful, nor yet the most interesting, among the churches of the city: neither has it the commanding situation of certain other cathedrals of the neighbouring provinces, such as Notre Dame at Le Puy, St. Maurice at Angers, or St. Front at Périgueux. In short, as to situation, it just misses what otherwise might have been a commanding location.
St. Radegonde overhangs the river Clain, but is yet far below the cathedral, which stands upon the eastern flank of an eminence, and from many points is lost entirely to view. From certain distant vantage-ground, the composition is, however, as complete and imposing an ensemble as might be desired, but decidedly the nearer view is not so pleasing, and somewhat mitigates the former estimate.
There is a certain uncouthness in the outlines of this church that does not bring it into competition with that class of the great churches of France known as les grandes cathédrales.
The general outline of the roof – omitting of course the scanty transepts – is very reminiscent of Bourges; and again of Albi. The ridge-pole is broken, however, by a slight differentiation of height between the choir and the nave, and the westerly towers scarcely rise above the roof itself.
The easterly termination is decidedly unusual, even unto peculiarity. It is not, after the English manner, of the squared east-end variety, nor yet does it possess an apse of conventional form, but rather is a combination of the two widely differing styles, with considerably more than a suggested apse when viewed from the interior, and merely a flat bare wall when seen from the outside. In addition three diminutive separate apses are attached thereto, and present in the completed arrangement a variation or species which is distinctly local.
The present edifice dates from 1162, its construction being largely due to the Countess Eleanor, queen to the young Earl Henry.
The high altar was dedicated in 1199, but the choir itself was not finished until a half-century later.
There is no triforium or clerestory, and, but for the aisles, the cathedral would approximate the dimensions and interior outlines of that great chambered church at Albi; as it is, it comes well within the classification called by the Germans hallenkirche.
Professor Freeman has said that a church that has aisles can hardly be called a typical Angevin church; but St. Pierre de Poitiers is distinctly Angevin in spite of the loftiness of its walls and pillars.
The west front is the most elaborate constructive element and is an addition of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with flanking towers of the same period which stand well forward and to one side, as at Rouen, and at Wells, in England.
The western doorway is decorated with sculptures of the fifteenth century, in a manner which somewhat suggests the work of the northern builders; who, says Fergusson, "were aiding the bishops of the southern dioceses to emulate in some degree the ambitious works of the Isle of France."
The ground-plan of this cathedral is curious, and shows, in its interior arrangements, a narrowing or drawing in of parts toward the east. This is caused mostly by the decreasing effect of height