Oratoire carolingien de Germigny-des-Prés

Germigny-des-Prés

In 806, Theodulf, Bishop of Orléans and Abbot of Fleury, a Visigoth from Spain, poet and one of the most brilliant minds at Charlemagne's court, had a private oratory built near his villa at Germigny, on a plan inspired by the East and clad in marble, stucco and mosaics. Of that dream-like decoration only one marvel survives — but what a marvel: the apse mosaic, the only Carolingian mosaic preserved in France, made of some one hundred and thirty thousand glass tesserae in shades of blue, gold and silver. It shows neither a Christ in Majesty nor a Virgin: true to his convictions about holy images, Theodulf had it depict the Ark of the Covenant of the Temple of Jerusalem, framed by cherubim and great archangels with wings outspread, beneath the hand of God. Covered with limewash, no doubt to protect it, the masterpiece was forgotten for centuries. Around 1820, so the story goes, the village priest noticed that children were playing with coloured glass cubes picked up in the church: the plaster on the vault was scraped away, and the treasure reappeared in its Byzantine splendour. Listed in 1840 among the first historic monuments of France, the oratory was restored from 1867 — not without losses, two apsidal chapels disappearing in the process. Beneath the dome of this thousand-year-old sanctuary, a stone's throw from the Loire, one physically feels what the "Carolingian Renaissance" was: a little jewel of the East set down in the meadows of the Loire Valley.

Getting there : Oratory in the village centre, route de Saint-Martin (D60), between Châteauneuf-sur-Loire and Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire. Parking in the village; timed lighting lets you admire the apse mosaic.

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound