Origin and history
The Abbey of St.Georges in Boscherville has its origins in a sacred site occupied since Gallo-Roman times. In the first century, a square wooden temple was erected, replaced in the second century by a fanum (Gallo-Roman temple). In the French era, a Christian funeral chapel was installed in the cella of the fanum, marking the transition to a Christian place of worship. Between the 7th and 11th centuries, several religious buildings followed, preparing for the establishment of a canon community in 1055 by Raoul de Tancarville. The chapel, which had become too small, was replaced by a collegiate church dedicated to Saint George, built on the site of the ancient temple.
In 1113 or 1114, William of Tancarville, chamberlain of King Henri I Beauclerc, hunts the canons to found the Benedictine abbey of Saint Georges. The monks from the abbey of Saint-Évroult benefit from the patronage of the Tancarvilles, which make them their family necropolis. The abbey church, Romanesque style, was built between the 12th and 13th centuries, with later Gothic contributions. Abbé Victor (1157–1211) erected the capitular hall, Norman Gothic masterpiece, and developed the claustral buildings. The abbey reached its peak until the middle of the thirteenth century, before a gradual decline marked by internal conflicts and the Hundred Years' War.
The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are marked by destruction and reconstruction. In 1562 Protestants looted the abbey, burning up some of the buildings. The Maurists, who arrived in 1660, restored the monastery and built a large classical house in the seventeenth century. The French Revolution rang the abbey's bells: abolished in 1790, its buildings were sold as national property, with the exception of the church, which became parish. In the 19th century, restorations saved the capitular hall and the church, classified as historical monuments in 1840. The gardens, redesigned according to old plans, get the remarkable Garden label.
The architecture of the Abbey reflects its many historical strata. The church, from plan to Latin cross, preserves a Romanesque nave vaulted of Gothic, a choir with arch vaults and a tower-lantern culminating at 57 meters. The capitular room, square and devoid of foothills, is distinguished by its carved capitals and Romanesque bays with Gothic ordinance. The cloister, now extinct, has left some classified remains, including a 12th century capital preserved at the Rouen Museum. The Mauritian stone buildings of Saint-Leu illustrate the monastery's adaptation to the classic requirements of the seventeenth century.
The abbey played a major spiritual and economic role in Normandy. With 28 churches under her patronage, priories in England and seigneurial rights (semes, forests, tolls), she earned 10,000 pounds in the 18th century. His decline accelerated with the beginning, where absent abbots, like the cardinals of Este, neglected monastic management. Despite the ravages of the religious wars and the revolutionary suppression, the abbey survived as a place of memory, attracting in the nineteenth century romantic artists and writers, such as Taylor, Nodier and Cotman, who contributed to its fame.
Today, the abbey Saint-Georges of Boscherville is a protected site, mixing religious, architectural and landscape heritage. The church, still parish, houses a historic organ of 1627, restored in 1994. The gardens, rebuilt from 17th century plans, offer an evocative setting of past monastic life. The site, open to the public, bears witness to nearly two millennia of history, from the Gallo-Roman temple to the Benedictine abbey, through Maurist transformations and contemporary restorations.
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