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Origin and history

The chapel Saint-André de Neuvy-le-Roi, a religious building with a rectangular plan, dates from the 6th century according to the accounts of Grégoire de Tours. It is said to have been founded after a French warrior, originally from Touraine, saved the relics of Saint-André in Burgundy in 524 and brought some of them back to Neuvy. His son, cured of a fever after a vow, would have built a "basilica" to house these relics. The present building, in stone and stone, dates mainly from the 11th and 12th centuries, with a nave and a square choir on cellar.

In the 11th century, the chapel had a rectangular plan with small stone walls, visible today on the north wall. In the 12th century, it was enlarged to the East by a square bedside lit with two bays in the middle of the hanger, while the upper parts of the nave were reshaped. The East Room on the second level retained almost erased frescoes, representing horsemen, an armed knight and a rough human silhouette.

In the 18th century, the bedside was reinforced by foothills and a moulure cornice. After the Revolution, the chapel was sold as a national property in 1796 to François Loiseau and in 1798 to Martin Charles Rondeau Martinière. Transformed into a saltpeter factory, she lost her western gate, moved to the southern wall of the parish church around 1802-1809. In 1829, the building was divided into two lots: the nave served as a barn, while the eastern part, organized on three levels, became a dwelling with a fireplace and a straight staircase.

Used as a place of storage and housing until 1990, the chapel was then bought by a sole proprietor to be restored. Its facades and roofs were inscribed in the Historical Monuments by order of 3 August 1992. Today, it bears witness to a complex history, mixing religious evolutions, secular reuses and preservation efforts.

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