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Origin and history

The chapel Saint-Michel de Coursegoules, located in the Alpes-Maritimes department, is a religious building whose origins probably date back to a Gallo-Roman fanum integrated into a villa. A funerary slab discovered on site, dated no later than the seventh century, attests to an ancient occupation. Latin inscription mentions two deceased young people, Fuscus and Favor, as well as their parents, suggesting a place of burial or early worship.

The present building, mainly built in the late 11th or early 12th century, has a semi-circular arched apse in cul-de-four and a two-span nave covered with a broken cradle (added in the 13th century). Architectural elements, such as a frieze of broken sticks at the top of the abside or a broken arch portal, reflect Romanesque and Gothic influences. The chapel was served by monks dependent on the abbey of Lérins, a link attesting its spiritual role in the region.

Ranked a historic monument in 1978, the chapel was restored in 1984. Its mixed apparatus (medium apparatus and bellows) and iron-drawn joints reveal various construction techniques. A truncated tower bell tower, adjacent to the south elevation, as well as a cruciform bay in the west wall, complete its architectural features. The chapel thus illustrates a superposition of periods, from late antiquity to the Middle Ages.

The site, located 1.3 km west of the village of Coursegoules, at the foot of the Cheiron mountain, was probably a gathering place for the surrounding houses, some of which depended on the territory of Lagnes. Its relative isolation and its state of conservation make it a rare testimony to the evolution of religious and architectural practices in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur.

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