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Origin and history

The Trinité Chapel is one of the seven historic chapels of Île Saint-Honorat, around the Lérins Abbey in the Bay of Cannes. She is famous for her dome, which Viollet-le-Duc considered the oldest in the West. Its architecture, combining nave and triconque choir, suggests two periods of construction: the nave could date from the 11th century under Abbé Aldebert II, while the choir would go back to the Ve-VIth centuries. The 19th century excavations revealed foundations of an adjacent hermitage and 17th century graves.

The island was occupied from 400-410 by Honorat and Caprais, with the agreement of the bishop of Fréjus, Saint Léonce. The abbey, secularized in 1787, was sold in 1791 to Jean Alziary de Roquefort, then passed into several hands, including that of Anglican pastor Henry Belmont Smith. In 1859, the bishop of Fréjus, Bishop Jordany, bought the island for 55,000 francs and began restorations from 1869. The chapel, transformed into a fort by the Spaniards in 1635, was restored from 1930 to its original appearance.

Ranked a Historical Monument in 1886, the chapel illustrates medieval religious architecture, with an elliptical dome on pendants, inspired by Byzantine models such as the mausoleum of Galla Placidia in Ravenna. Its trapezoidal plan and its double arches make it a unique testimony of paleo-Christian and Romanesque art in Provence. The excavations also revealed a cistern and a freshwater well, considered miraculous, suggesting an early monastic occupation.

The abbey of Lérins, on which the chapel depends, was a major spiritual home since the fifth century. The monks lived there until the Revolution, when the site was partially abandoned. In the 19th century, restorations preserved this heritage, now accessible to visitors. The chapel, with its three apse choir and its vaulted nave in a cradle, remains a rare example of a religious building at the crossroads of ancient and medieval influences.

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