Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The church of Saint Martin de Francs, located at the top of a terre dominating the vineyards, is an atypical monument built in 1605 on the ruins of a Romanesque church destroyed in 1578 during the Wars of Religion. Although its architecture imitates the Romanesque style of the 12th century, it incorporates Gothic elements (buttress, western door) and classical elements (moulds, modillons). This stylistic mixture sparked debates among local historians, such as Auguste Bontemps and Jean-Auguste Brutails, who differed on his exact dating.

The building, with a single rectangular nave and a semicircular apse, was visited several times by religious dignitaries. In 1606 the cardinal of Sourdis judged her "small and without sacristy", while in 1617 she was described as finished. A sacristy was later added south of the bedside. Its bell tower-wall, its multiple archatures and its reinterpreted modillons (without moral dimension, unlike the original novels) reflect an ambitious reconstruction, mixing tradition and modernity.

Classified as a Historical Monument in 1908, the church illustrates the persistence of Romanesque forms in Bordelais in the seventeenth century, while revealing technical and aesthetic adaptations specific to its time. Its simple plan, its walled structure (instead of a planned vault) and its false bays underline a desire to reinvent the architectural past in a post-war context of Religion, marked by the reconstruction and reaffirmation of Catholic power.

The minutes of the episcopal visits (1617, 1687, 1728) specify its evolution: vaulting of the choir, addition of a sacristy, and its attachment in 1728 to the priory-curé Notre-Dame de la Fayotte, alongside the church of Saint-Pierre de Salles. These documents attest to its central role in local religious life, despite its modest size.

The apparatus is more regular than in regional Romanesque churches, and its hybrid details (Romanesque archvolts, Gothic profiles, classical grooves) make it a unique testimony of stylistic transitions. Modillons, devoid of moral symbolism, embody this free reinterpretation of the late novel, adapted to the tastes of classical age.

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