Free visit of the Saint-Martin church
Of Romanesque origin, the wooden vault and the blocks date from the 16th century. What to see: The 15th century virgin bird and the woodwork of the monks of the old abbey.
17 et 18 septembre 2022Passat
Inscripcion
02 35 90 71 66© Eglise Saint-Martin
In 1195 Hugues III de Gournay founded, near his manor of Bellozanne, an abbey entrusted to Premonstratensian Religious. The dissolution of this order in 1770 led to the disappearance of the abbey. In the church of Saint-Martin many woodwork and furniture come from this Abbey. Wood carving was one of its activities. The works were made of oak from the nearby Bray forest.
- The church is lit by sixteen small windows with geometric stained-glass windows in the nave and recounting figures from holy history in the transepts and in the choir. - The walls of the choir are fully panelled near their height. - The nave vault is a beautiful 16th century wooden cradle with two rows of decorative elements: stars, crosses, dolphins, etc. - 4 beams are sculpted at their ends with grimacing figures and fins. Behind the altar are beautiful representations of the virtues treated in high relief, from left to right: - the Force (covered with a lion’s body), - the Justice (the balance and the sword), - the Faith (it wears a veil on the head and the chalice), - the Charity (nursing woman a child), - Prudence (holds the serpent and looks at the mirror), - Temperance (pours water into a wine vase). - Four angels carry the instruments of the Passion.
Most of the decorative furniture comes from the abbey of Bellozanne: the polychrome altar, the pulpit, the woodwork decorating the choir, the stalls, the altarpieces of the two side altars representing the Assumption and Saint-Norbert, as well as the 4 wooded sculptures with the theme of the Last Judgment. (Death, the Triumph of Faith over Heresy, the Triumph of Heaven, the Resurrection).