Explore Religious Heritage Across Europe

In front of his castle of Fontaine, Aleth de Montbard, had a chapel built in 1102; dedicated to St. Ambrosinian. She was the mother of Bernard de Fontaine, the future St Bernard, born at the Château de Fontaine (near Dijon). The present church under the name of St Bernard is built on its site, and the present building has a construction dating back to the 14th and 16th centuries.

Located in Dimancheville in the Loiret, the Saint Blaise church dates from the 12th century; traces of this distant past are still observable today. The building consists of two contrasting section: the choir, from the beginning of the 13th century, is preceded by a nave that was rebuilt at the end of the 15th century. Since 2005, the church has been classified as a Historic Monument. It also has unique decor and furniture, such as a polychrome wooden altarpiece and murals.

The Church of Saint-Blaise is located in Montaigu, in Burgundy-Franche-Comté. Originally a single spanned church in the thirteenth century, an additional 4 spans were added in the 17th century, and with side chapels and vaulted arcades. Outside, the bell tower was built in 1685, replacing a very modest older tower, which was originally erected upon the choir. Note that the composer of the Marseillaise, Rouget de l'Isle grew up in this village.

Built from 1513 on the plans of Guillaume Pelvoysin, the church was consecrated and definitively completed the same year, in 1539. It is truly an attractive building due to its unusual exterior: the continuous roof covering its side chapels is not commonplace. If you are arriving from the station, take a few moments to enter the building. You will admire its rather simple Gothic architecture and its Renaissance canopies, some of which are attributed to Jean Lécuyer.

The church of St Brice de Courcival was built in the eleventh century. The only remains of the original building are the north wall of the nave and two Romanesque bays. The church was enlarged in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries by the addition of chapels and a bell tower. It was restored in the nineteenth century, and now the church has a single nave with a chancel and two chapels, forming the transept. Inside the building, you can admire a seventeenth century terracotta statue of the Madonna and Child.

Numerous archaeological excavations were carried out around the church, bringing to light Merovingian sarcophagi and burials possibly dating back to the 15th century. The neo-Gothic stained glass windows of the chevet date from 1854: the three canopies depict the life of Christ. The stained glass of the northern chapel is dedicated to the Virgin and that of the southern chapel to Saint Genevieve.

The Saint Christopher church is dedicated to Saint Christopher, a martyr, who is the patron saint of travellers. It dominates the town of La Tour-du-Meix in the Jura. The original 12th century building was rebuilt in the 15th century by the abbot of St Claude. The church includes a bell tower and a Romanesque nave extended by a choir leaning against the rock at the top of the ridge. The bell tower contains one of the oldest Jura bells. This church shelters an imposing statue of Saint Christopher.

The Church of Saint-Christophe is located in Mondreville, in Île-de-France. It displays the harmonious coexistence of Romanesque elements in the nave and the Gothic style in the choir and carved 16th century decorations on the nave frame. The building, topped with a small bell tower with an octagonal spire, is endowed with a rich movable heritage such as a statue of the Virgin and Child, from the 15th century.

The Church of Saint-Christophe, registered with the Historical Monuments, is located in Saint-Christophe-en-Bresse in Burgundy-Franche-Comté region. It is one of the few Romanesque churches of Burgundy Bresse. The twelfth century church was ravaged in the sixteenth century and rebuilt in the nineteenth century. It has a nave with three vaulted vessels, a transept and a chevet including an apse and two apsidioles, one of which houses a polychrome wooded statue of the Virgin of Pity, dated to the late fifteenth century.

The Church of Saint-Clair of Saint-Porquier, Occitania was built in the sixteenth century, on the foundations of an older, eleventh century building that was ruined during the Hundred Years War. The building is of Southern Gothic style. It consists of a nave that opens on a three sided choir, flanked with side chapels. An octagonal bell-tower is flanked by a staircase turret. The interior was painted in the late nineteenth century.