Collégiale Saint-Pierre de Chauvigny

Chauvigny

On its spur overlooking the Vienne, Chauvigny was the stronghold of the bishops of Poitiers, who were its lords and barons: five castles still bristle on the promontory. In the midst of the keeps, the canons raised the collegiate church of Saint-Pierre in the 11th and 12th centuries, a jewel of Poitevin Romanesque with a chevet tiered with blind arcading. But the real journey begins in the choir. There, on the capitals of the apse, a sculptor left his name — GOFRIDUS ME FECIT, "Gofridus made me", carved beneath the Adoration of the Magi — an artist's signature exceedingly rare for the period. Around the scenes of Christ's childhood (Annunciation, Epiphany, Presentation in the Temple, Temptation in the desert) swarms a bestiary of nightmare: lion-headed dragons swallowing men head first, winged sphinxes with fixed stares, a contorted dancer thrown to the beasts, demonic masks, birds of prey carrying off small figures. On one pillar the archangel Michael weighs souls while Satan tries to tip the scales; further on sits enthroned the Great Harlot, Babylon, a figure from the Apocalypse. For the medieval pilgrim who halted between Poitiers and Saint-Savin, these stones were a sermon: salvation and the monster's maw contend for every soul. Nine centuries later, the lesson of Gofridus, served by restored polychromy and the light of the ambulatory, remains one of the most striking sculpted ensembles of Romanesque art.

Getting there : Plan Saint-Pierre, in the upper town (medieval cité), on the promontory overlooking the Vienne. Walk up from the lower town or park on the edge of the cité; free admission. Approach coordinates centred on the medieval cité.

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

Ambient sound