11 juin 2007
The Notre-Dame cathedral and Saint-Privat in Mende
The
area is an old site of settlement going up at the age of bronze, but
the city strictly speaking dates only from the Middle Ages. (Viculus
Mimatensis, drawn from the Mimât Mount where the hermitage of Privat
Saint is). the mountain of Gévaudan was a place crowned for the Celts
who venerated the goddess-mother.
951
is the date often advanced like that of the constitution of évêché of
Mende. Before this one, a church was to rise, according to the habit,
above the crypt of Privat Saint for glorifier this martyrdom which
caused many pilgrimage in the town of Mende.
Gévaudan,
in XIIème century, it was covered with Romance, humble churches for the
majority but of an austere beauty, in harmony with this ground.
It was the pope gévaudanais Urbain V who offered to his native diocese the Gothic cathedral. In March 1369, it gives to the future cathedral an invaluable relic: a spine of the crown of Christ that Saint Louis had brought back Holy Land. (I do not tell you the weight of his bags in this poor Louis, with all that it brought back of over there. Fortunately for him, I think that it had carriers…) It gives also the chief of Blaise saint and the reliquaries.
Work
of 1369-70 made it possible to build the nave. Many foreign stone
masons joined the workmen country: one reconnait the project
superintendent Pierre Morel, of Majorque. (It built Chair-God, which
has same dimensions that Mende, then one will find it in Lyon and
Avignon) and Pierre Juglar. (which built later the Holy Vault of Riom
and the palate of the Duke of Berry)
The
death of the pope marks the stoppage of the works. During 60 years, the
cathedral was reduced to the nave: in the medium, side southern, the
furnace bridge of the Holy-Cross, with the desus of the crypt of Privat
Saint, the taisseries of the galères of Urbain V decorated the walls;
in the cupboard with the relics, one had locked up the Virgin, holy
Blaise and the invaluable jewels.
the
cathedral was devoted in 1521, just as the monumental bell of the
northern tower, baptized “the nonsimilar one of all Christendom”.
(larger bell in the world, melted between 1517 and 1521 in Villefort
and destroyed at the time of the wars of religion. There remains about
it only the leaf. )
Destroyed
mainly during the wars of religion, the building was restored in two
stages: each time, one sought to join again with the Gothic style. This
principle governed the rapid rebuilding which intervened at the
beginning of the 17th century - what is an exceptional fact -, but also
the important work started of 1868 to 1906, where the architects sought
to imitate the Gothic of the XV ème century. One then restored the
carved decorations - and sometimes they were restored. The vaults,
arched in cradle, were covered with a ribbed vault.
Some dates and figures:
Length: 67 meters, total Width: 29, Height: 25. Apse surrounded by a déambulatoire (not of transept nor of apsidal chapels). The side chapels are rectangular and the two vaults of Notre-Dame and Privat saint are pentagonal.
1105: dedication of the furnace bridge
1308: Urbain V makes build the nave
1452-1467: completion of the nave and construction of the apse.
1508-1516: construction of the two bell-towers
1581: Blackbird destroys most of the nave
1599-1605: rebuilding without ornaments
1846: installation of 9 bells from Avignon
1855: One releases the building in the south by the demolition of the episcopal palate. One remakes the gates north and south in the blazing style
1896-1905: one builds the large porch of entry under the rosette.
Unmemorable
time, the Church of Mende is under the patronage of Privat Saint. In
his history of Frank, Gregoire de Tours reports the circumstances of
his death and arranges it among the famous saints of Gaules, with Denis
of Paris, Saturnin of Toulouse, Martial of Limoges, Martin de Tours,
Ferréeol of Vienna, Julien de Brioude…
Saint Privat would have been sent in Gévaudan by Saint Austremoine. He would have been born in Coudes, not far from Clermont.
The
dated August 21 one would be that of its martyrdom. Gregoire de Tours
locates it at the time of Valérien and Gallien (253-260). In his work
on Saint Privat the Remize canon says that it was martyrisé by the
bands of Chrocus to the worms year 258. At that time, of Alamans
devastated Gévaudan after having ruined Javols. Defense concentrated on
the fortress of Grèzes which held in failure the invaders.
Those reflect the hand on Saint Privat taken refuge in the cave of the
Mimat Mount. It refused to order the capitulation of its people.
Maltreated and pushed with blows of sticks until Mende, one asked him
to sacrifice to the idols. On a new refusal, the torturers continued
with the supplicier and withdrew themselves, believing their dead
victim. Not having been able to obtain the realization of their
project, Alamans treated with besieged and left the country. Saint
Privat was not long in succumbing and was buried in a crypt of the
cathedral of Mende.
Towards 631, its body was transported to Saint
Denis close to Paris. Towards 776, it was transferred to Salone in
Lorraine. Several localities of the name of Privat Saint, give a report
on this stay. Later, a monk of the name of Clocbert brought back it in
Gévaudan; on the way of the return of the churches were built under its
term in the surroundings of Orleans and Bourges.
Mendois
dissimulated the remainders of Privat Saint in the basements of the
church Sainte Thècle in the west of the large current bell-tower of the
cathedral until 1170, where the bishop Aldebert III of Tournel brought
back it in the primitive crypt. In 1579, the wars of religion and later
the Revolution made disappear partly its relics. What remains about it
is preserved in the church of the Hermitage.
The worship of Privat
Saint was always maintained in the diocese of Mende. The book of the
“Miracles of St Privat” reports a certain number of extraordinary facts
which are allotted to him.
The cave of the Mimat Mount, forever ceased being a attended place
of pilgrimage. As of Xlle century the bishop installs there with
residence, a chaplain. The various buildings which border it nowadays,
constitute a site favourable with meditation and the prayer.
About
fifteen parishes lozériennes are honoured with patronage with Privat
Saint. The surface of its radiation extends well beyond the diocese.
All that marks the credit which still the Saint enjoys that Gévaudan
had as an apostle.
The black virgin of Mende
This virgin with the Byzantine lines, the cross ones would have brought it back the East by Guillaume de Peyre between between 1212 and 1222, where the monks of the Carmel mount, heirs to Isaïe, would have carved it in a very hard wood, (perhaps of the olive-tree), “in the worship of the virgin-mother. She is dated however from the XI ème century.
Sat on a seat of recent time, draped in a dress with the harmonious folds, it tightens the arms ahead. all the body was painted in red, only the head and the neck is covered with a black varnish.
It appears in the history since 1249: Randon de Chateauneuf pays homage to the bishop Odilon de Mercoeur in front of “the altar of Madona Santa Maria, in the gleiza of Mende”.
Twice
it was saved destruction. In 1579, when Huguenots had taken Mende, an
old woman would have had the easy way to request “this old wood stock”
for her fire from the soldiers of Blackbird who were going to burn it.
On December 8, 1793, the revolutionists threw it to bottom of its
throne to make ride on the furnace bridge the goddess reason. After the
festival, a woman came to collect the forgotten statue and carried it,
furtively, under its coat.
On August 15, 1894, one made him leave his vault (vault of the marriages which was later that of Roch Saint) to again install it on the maitre-furnace bridge.
Returned with its vault in 1960, since the maitre-furnace bridge is nothing any more but one simple table.
A impressionant number of relics are hidden between its two shoulders, in a mask-reliquary, which is almost single in the black virgins. The canonical inventory of 1857 gives the detail of it:
Hair of the virgin, pieces of her clothing, its tomb, fragments of the true-cross, without forgetting remainders of the Saints Pierre, Andre, Paul, Martial, Denis, Jacques…
For the fiftieth anniversary of his crowning, in 1946, the former priest of Mende wrote these lines:
“The 15 most outstanding Lozériennes Madonna were the guests of Notre-Dame de Mende: ones come in person, like that of Carce (Marvejols), of any capacity (Langogne), Pity (Saint chély); others, too heavy to move, had been made represent: thus virgins of the rock (Meyrueis and Serverette) or of the sentinel (Nasbinals). The Madonna of Quézac, Nogaret, Malène were there; that of the good-help (Salelles), Beaulieu (Paulhac), Salette (Saint-Privat of Vallongue), of all graces (Cheylard the bishop) and finally that of Bouldoire, the least old last but not. All attended this parade, which had astonished our aïeux by the means-äge, accustomed however to the processions of relics and the gatherings of prelates.”
One will never know what became his/her son .....
for the black virgins, to see here
The water supply fountains and network in Mende
In
all descriptions of Mende, since the Middle Ages, one speaks about the
great number of fountains. Water also curves under the houses through
an underground canal system which joins the Batch.
Not
astonishing that a small Lady elected residence in the middle of all
that! Water, the mountain of Carried out not far, where Saint Privat
holds place of parèdre in the absence of Saint Michel. There is even
its cave… But it will be for a forthcoming visit.
The
fountain which is in the south of the cathedral calls the “fountain of
the griffon”. Griffon is a word occitan which indicates the gushing of
a source. Mendois know the fountain like the fountain of Aoumenet, the
small man, who controls the output of water and carries on his poingt a
falcon whose nozzle lets run a filament of water. This fountain existed
already with the XV ème century. It is one of most important of Mende,
because of its high position, which made it possible its abundant water
to run out in almost all the streets of the city.