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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The chapel of Saint-Hippolyte de Névache, built in the 15th century, is a stone-cut stone chainless stone building covered with a two-paned shingle roof. Its flat bedside and bell tower-wall to a bay, rising the triumphal arch, characterize its sober architecture. It consists of two vaulted spans of ridges and a vaulted chorus of dogives, with a later sacristy. Today, isolated from the road leading to the Elchelle Pass, it once belonged to a hamlet whose ruins still remained in the 20th century.

According to an oral tradition, this chapel would have served as a parish church for the inhabitants of Nevache before the building of the church of Saint Marcellin-Saint-Antoine. It housed a 15th-century mural depicting Saint Christophe and Saint Antoine hermite, transferred in 1937 on canvas and moved to the parish church. The building, owned by the commune, was inscribed in the Historical Monuments by order of 1 July 1986, thus protecting its architectural and artistic heritage.

The location of the chapel, on the left bank of the Clarea, reflects its historic anchoring in a territory marked by transalpine exchanges via the col de l'Échelle. Its current isolation contrasts with its past role in the heart of a rural community, whose remains still bear witness to a dense occupation in medieval and modern times. The chapel thus illustrates the evolution of religious practices and housing in the Alpine valleys, between gradual abandonment of hamlets and concentration around the villages.

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