Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The church of Saint-André de Monflanquin was founded in the 13th century, when the bastide was founded in 1256 by Alphonse de Poitiers, Count of Toulouse. Built between 1256 and 1290 on the site of a castral chapel dedicated to Saint Mary, it has a unique nave and a deviated axis, a rare characteristic. The bastide, ceded by the lord of Calviac, benefited from a charter of customs (1256, confirmed in 1269) protecting its inhabitants. Upon the death of Alphonse and Jeanne de Toulouse (1271), Monflanquin passed under French sovereignty, then English after the Treaty of Amiens (1279).

During the Wars of Religion, the church became a conflicting issue. In 1562 Monflanquin joined the Protestants, who occupied the building and made it their temple. In 1589 Henry IV entrusted the city to Jacques Nompar de Caumont, Duke of La Force. After the Protestant rebellion of 1621, Louis XIII ordered the destruction of the castle and ramparts (1622). In 1673, Catholics recovered the church, now under the name of St Andrew, while Protestants had to build their temple elsewhere.

In the 18th century, the bishop of Agen noticed the deterioration of the church. A partial reconstruction took place between 1715 and 1733, preserving the apse, the northern chapel and the 13th century façade, but removing five side chapels and replacing the vaults with a walled ceiling. The walls are lowered, and the bell tower, in ruins, is replaced by arcades. In 1846, the ceiling threatened to collapse, triggering a new construction campaign.

Between 1853 and 1860, the council decided to raise the walls, restore the ogival windows and rebuild the vaults, giving the church its medieval style. The bell tower, crushed after its reconstruction, was rebuilt in 1923 in a style inspired by Toulouse buildings, with arcades and slots. The church was finally listed as historical monuments on 16 July 1925, protecting its western façade.

The organ, installed in 1867, comes from a church in Bergerac (1855) and is restored by Miche Jouve. The oldest stained glass windows, made in 1879 by Henri Feur, are alongside modern creations in broken glass signed by the Benedictines of En-Calcat. These elements illustrate the artistic and cultural transformations of the building over the centuries.

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