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Origin and history

The church Saint-Jean-Baptiste of Brienne-sur-Aisne, located in the department of Ardennes (Great East), is a religious building whose construction is attributed to the monks of the Priory of Evergnicourt, on the other bank of the Aisne, between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Local residents participated in its construction. The church, dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, blends various architectural styles: the bedside, the transept, the lateral porch and the south gate date from the first Gothic age, while the four spans of the nave were rebuilt in the 19th century. Its walls, composed of sandstone at the bottom and soft chalk at the top, are pierced by eight elegant windows and surmounted by a double moulding cornice.

The main gate, decorated with an eight lobes rosette, is framed with square pillars supporting a three-ribed broken arch. A round turret pierced by murderers, housing the staircase leading to the bell tower, is on the north face. Inside, the dog-like branches of the transept, choir and abside fall on finely carved capitals, rising straight pillars decorated with rounded tore columns. The main altar of the seventeenth century, of Corinthian style, is surmounted by an unsigned canvas depicting the Baptism of Christ, attributed to Nicolas Wilbault. Among the outstanding liturgical objects are a 17th-century ostensoir, Limousin chasses in enamels, and a baptismal tank in Givet blue stone decorated with human heads.

The church also houses commemorative elements, such as a tombstone bearing the effigies of Jacques d'Averhoult, captain of the regiment of Turenne, and his wife Jeanne de Son. An inscription recalls Messire de Feret, seigneur of Brienne, who died in 1721, while an epitaph honors Hubert Pirotte de Huguet, parish priest. The building, which was linked successively to the dioceses of Laon, Sedan (1791-Concordat), Metz (Concordat-1822), and Reims, was listed as a historical monument in 1926. Its four-slope bell tower, raised on a square plane, houses two bells and dominates the village, located along Route D925, near the town hall.

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