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Origin and history

The collegiate Saint-Aignan d'Orléans, located on the north bank of the Loire, is dedicated to Saint Aignan, bishop of Orléans died around 453. According to legend, he stopped the Huns in 451 thanks to a divine intervention transforming sand into wasps, before the late arrival of the Roman troops of Flavius Aetius. Canonized, he became the patron saint of the city. A first Benedictine abbey developed there from the 7th century, before becoming a collegiate canon in the 9th century, under the impulse of Theodulfe, bishop and councillor of Charlemagne.

The building suffered multiple destruction: looted by the Vikings in 865, destroyed by a fire in 999, then shaved in 1029 before being rebuilt by Robert II the Pious. The Romanesque crypt, consecrated in 1029, is the only vestige of this time. During the Hundred Years War, the church was destroyed in 1358 and 1428 for fear of the English besiegants, then rebuilt between 1439 and 1509 under the reigns of Charles VII and Louis XI, who integrated into the urban enclosure. The wars of Religion (1562-1567) again damaged the building: the Huguenots looted the relics of Saint Aignan and burned down the nave, reduced to ruin until its demolition in 1804.

The college had a canon chapter and a professional choir, composed of a dozen adult singers and six children, specialized in plain-song and polyphonic motets. Composers such as Eloy d'Amerval (15th century), author of a five-voice Mass and the Book of Devilry, or Charles Hérissé (18th century), practiced there. The organ, attested as early as 1446, played a central role in ceremonies. After the Revolution, the church, sold as a national property, was partially destroyed by architect Benoît Lebrun. Ranked a historic monument in 1910, it now retains only its Gothic choir, its walk-in, its transepts and its Romanesque crypt, classified in 1840.

The current architecture reflects these historical strata: the choir, vaulted at 22 meters, and the five absidial chapels date back to the 15th-XVIth centuries, while the crypt, semi-entered, reveals some of the oldest capitals of Romanesque art (XI century), like that representing Daniel in the lions pit. A 19th-century fresco, in the bedside chapel, still sank today because of old infiltrations. The collegiate church, once the second canonical chapter of Orleans after St. Croix Cathedral, illustrates the religious and political importance of the city, linked to the royal power since Robert the Pious.

Among the outstanding music masters are Abraham Fourdy (1588-1633), winner of the Puy de musique d'Évreux, or Nicolas Formé (1616-1624), canon and composer of the Royal Chapel, known for his double choir works. The last master, Léonard Cabart, left Saint-Aignan in 1790 during the dispersion of the chapter. The organs, rebuilt in 1872 by Charles Baurain, succeeded a 15th century instrument, played during the solemn entry of Louis XI in 1461.

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