Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The Saint Vincent church of Neuvy-le-Roi, founded in the 6th century according to Grégoire de Tours, sees its first stone building built between the 11th and 12th centuries, with a unique nave and a semicircular choir. The remaining walls (west elevation and 1st span of the south wall) date from this period. Between the 12th and 13th centuries, the nave and the choir were equipped with arched arches in the angelvin style, supported by committed column pillars and formet arches. A stair turret is added to access the bell tower at the end of the south wall.

In the 16th century, the church expanded with the construction of the northern collateral and the foundation, in 1519, of the chapel of the Conception (current chapel of the Virgin) by Thomas de Lisle, vicar of Neuvy. The initial buttresses, now integrated, give a particular profile to the pillars. Between 1580 and 1586, the northern collateral was vaulted with ivy and third-line pendants. The chapel of Jacques de Beaune (Lord of the Provost) was built at the beginning of the 16th century in the southern collateral, while in 1543, Jean de Castelnau founded a funeral chapel Saint-Nicolas, destroyed in 1807.

The modifications continued in the 17th to 18th centuries with a frame bell tower on the 2nd span of the nave. At the beginning of the 19th century, a Romanesque portal from the Church of St Andrew of Neuvy (sold as national property) was installed on the south wall. The furniture and stained glass windows were built in the 19th century, while a 1778 estimate already indicated the poor condition of the covers. The building, classified as a Historical Monument in 1921, illustrates a superimposition of styles — Romanesque, Gothic and Renaissance — reflecting its evolution over nearly a thousand years.

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