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Key figures

Origin and history

The parish church Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Revel, located in the medieval village of Revel (comune of Revel-Tourdan), is mentioned for the first time around 1080. Originally, it was a chapel linked to the castral village of Revel, then associated with the parish of Tourdan. An old cemetery surrounded the building, with still visible entrances such as the "door of the dead" or the "children's cemetery". The enlargement work of 1833 temporarily moved the burials to Tourdan.

The church has undergone numerous architectural transformations, mixing Romanesque and Gothic styles. The portal, the bell tower and a south window date back to the Romanesque period, while columns and a reamped window in the choir reflect Gothic additions. In 1770 a door was pierced under the bell tower, and in 1851, a Republican inscription ("R.F. D.O.M. 1851) was added to the gate. Work in 1954 shifted the nave to widen the street.

The church was restored over twenty years from 2001, thanks to the municipality and a local association. In 2016, the building was completely rehabilitated. The 18th-century high altar, classified in 1993, was restored in 2021. The furniture, registered in 2009, and the chapels dedicated to Notre-Dame and to Saints Anne and Marguerite bear witness to her rich religious past.

The interior houses a bell recast in 1829 and then replaced in 1907, and a clock whose mechanism (1969) is kept in town hall. Until the Revolution, a parish priest and vicar managed the parishes of Revel and Tourdan, as evidenced by the records of 1609. The local school, led by Mr. Pollard, was attached to the church, where the "children's cemetery" was discovered.

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