Saint-Saturnin of Cusset

11 juin 2007

Saint-Saturnin of Cusset

Cussiacus fundus, at the time Gallo-Roman, left us few traces: elements of hypocauste and ceramics were put at the day places Victor-Hugo in 1992 and passage of Valmy in 1994. Gallo-Roman period vestiges of aqueducts and hypocauste were discovered which attests presence of a villa.
In 886, Eumène, bishop of Nevers, melt a Benedictine abbey women (the building is occupied today by the town hall).
On July 17, 1440, the dolphin Louis, future Louis XI, was reconciled there with his/her father Charles VII, putting thus fine at Praguerie.

Louis XI become king, it makes rebuild the fortifications of the city by the project superintendent Vauzy of Saint Martin's day, of 1476 to 1483. With their walls with embossings, their drain-holes with embrasures with the Frenchwoman (in X), they constitute the prototype of the modern fortification, able to answer the attacks of the metal balls; Vauban will make use of it of model. Destroyed gradually starting from the XVIIème century, it as a subisist only one tower (which shelters the museum) and the undergrounds, i.e. galleries of ground floor of the doors which were found buried during the filling of the ditches.
An abbey of chocolate éclairs bénédictines is installed by Eumène, bishop of Nevers. It imposes a true domination on the city during several centuries while contributing to its development.

In XIème century, Cusset, place of transit between Bourbonnais, Auvergne and the provinces of the center, are the seat many fairs. The population increases, also attracted by the court of the bailliage to the black Virgin. In XIIIème century, the first fortifications surround “the only city which was royal field in Combining and the Loire”, dixit Philippe the Beautiful one.

The parish church Saint-Saturnin, medieval, was rebuilt for reasons of outdatedness between 1859 and 1868, in the fields of the Parisian architect Jean-baptiste Lassus (1807-1857) who chose a building in the taste of XIIIème century.
The church is dedicated to Saturnin, bishop of Toulouse, martyrized in the years 250-251; shown to make dumb the oracle of the temple pagan, it was attached to a bull and had the crashed to pieces head when the animal started to descend the staircase of Capitole. It is considered to cure the men of the giddiness and the sheep of the disease of tournis.

The church exeptionnellement is exeptionnellement directed in north, and not in the east for problems of place within urban fabric. The plan is basilical, the nonprojecting transept. The nave with 6 spans is flanked sides. The bedside with déambulatoire is surrounded by two sacristies, of the turret of the staircase of the bell-tower and 3 pentagonal radiating chapels. The building, whose base is out of stone of Volvic, is built out of stone of Gannat and the decorations carved out of stone of Apremont.
For these decorations, Lassus took as a starting point the the notebooks of sketch of Villard de Honnecourt which it had discovered with the imperial library and makes publish.

The gate of the principal frontage is divided into two parts. The lintels are engraved Latin inscriptions pointing out the history of construction. Inside, the capitals are carved by Martial Liandrat.

The black virgin

The current statue is a copy of substitution. One still has the hands of the old statue, in the treasure of the church. They are dated from Xème century and are decorated bracelets of vermeil on which cups are fixed containing a chalcedony for the left hand and the right hand two cornalines, Roman intaglios representing Athéna-Minerve and a bouquet with a rudder.

The statue was found towards Xème century, according to the legend, on a fountain of the abbey of Cusset. The worship of Notre-Dame de Cusset was considerable and the kings of France Louis XI and Philippe the Beautiful one honoured it and covered it gifts. In 1629, it stopped the plague which devastated the city.

But celà did not prevent the statue from being destroyed with the revolution, and in spite of the new statue remade with the manner of old, its worship, which was one of largest the pélerinages to the Middle Ages, fell into the lapse of memory. (Jacques Bonvin, black Virgins)