A Bull in the Basilica

Sun 02 Jul

There has been much anticipation of today's events which requires us to take two cars the 110 odd kms into Toulouse. Our first visit involves the beautiful Basilica St Sernin followed by lunch on the Rue de Taur. Secondly, and with mixed feelings, we attend the 'Feria Fenouillet' or Fenouillet Fair to watch the 'corrida' or bullfights in the arena. The two activities are poles apart save that they both involve bulls,and demand separate blog entries.

I have briefly mentioned the Basilica previously (see 'The Sounds of Angels' 20 May 06) as we had a short visit to it the day we picked up Graham and Barbara. This visit has been better planned and given the time it deserves.

The Michelin 'Green Guide' describes the Basilica as the most famous and most magnificent of the great Romanesque pilgrimage churches in the south of France.

I realized I was not really sure what Romanesque meant so I did some research.
The term refers literally to the intent of designing in the style and manner of Rome. As a style, it reveals the master masons craft, with its concern for architecture rather than sculpture. The most recognizable feature of Romanesque buildings is their massiveness. Their Gothic descendents appear much more slender. An important structural development in Romanesque churches was the vaulted roofs as an alternative to fire prone wooden roofs. Vaults became a major architectural innovation in ensuing centuries.

Abbeys and monasteries in the 9th and 10th centuries ignited demand for larger, more utilitarian buildings. Large monastic orders required facilities for housing, industry, and religious purposes so the new building skills and techniques emerged.

Architectural forms in Europe are dated along the following lines:

Carolingian.....800-900
Ottonian........1000s
Romanesque......1000s-1100s
Gothic..........late 1100s-1400s
Renaissance.....1400s-1600

Even for a Romanesque church, St Sernin is particularly vast, measuring 115 metres in length, 64 metres wide, and a bell tower surmounted by a spire is 65 metres high.

Pilgrims came from far and wide to honour the martyr St Sernin who, in 250, refused to sacrifice a bull to pagan gods and was consequently tied to the bull and dragged to his death along the Rue de Taur.

As mentioned before, the church is predominately made with red bricks as stone was too expensive to bring to Toulouse. Inside, the sheer size is at once awesome yet peaceful. In the chancel, beneath the dome of the transept crossing is a table of Pyrenean marble from the altar consecrated by Pope Urban II in 1096. In the ambulatory (the area to the side of and behind the altar) and in the crypt there are numerous altar-pieces and reliquaries on display. Carved, gilded, and painted wooden caskets contain the remains of various Saints.

After our visit we went down the Rue de Taur for a lunch of salads and crepes before moving onto Fenouillet.