The church as we know it today only came about in the second half of the 16th century, with an apse, a nave (placed at a slight angle from the apse), three chapels on the northern side and three chapels on the southern side...
The building was then given its flamboyant gothic style windows and a large doorway, with arched mouldings resting on double columns adorned with acanthus leaves. The church can also be entered through a small side door on the southern side. This is known as the “door of the dead”. There is a sundial above this door.
The interior of the church was only decorated in the 17th and 18th centuries, when it was given four limestone altarpieces and the master altarpiece – a painted and gilded wooden altar with a tapestry depicting the Resurrection. There are also sculpted trunks, benches, eulogists’ stools and liturgical objects, all essential to religious ceremonies in the 17th century and all adding to the building’s interest today.
The church was renovated in the second half of the 19th century (work on the roof and the north chapel, and renovation of the bell and the spire, as well as the transfer of the cemetery which, until then, surrounded the church).
After the Second World War, the stained glass windows were completely renovated and the northern chapel restored once again. Then the church was taken over by the public authorities, who had the building and its contents listed (the statues and the stone altarpieces in the northern chapel, along with the solid wood suffering Christ) in the 1960s.
At the turn of the 21st century, a new round of renovation work was required to protect the monument (upper stonework, roof frames and covering).
A plan of the primitive church can be found in texts dating from the 12th century. At this time, the building only comprised a Romanesque apse then, in the 13th century, a short nave was added.
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THE CHURCH IS A LISTED BUILDING AND IS ONE OF THE VILLAGE’S MAIN HERITAGE ASSETS.
© Verrières Patrimoine 2012