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Origin and history

The church of Saint-Nicolas de Villiers-sur-Port, located in Port-en-Bessin-Huppain (Calvados), is a Roman Catholic building built in the 12th and 13th centuries. It illustrates an architectural transition between the Romanesque style, visible in its base, and the Gothic, marked by its bell tower surmounted by an octagonal arrow, as well as by seigneurial chapels arranged in the nave. Classified as a historical monument in 1922, it bears witness to a turbulent history, linked to the evolution of local parishes and the successive transformations of its interior space, such as the closing of the porch under the bell tower in the 17th or 18th centuries to install a altarpiece.

Originally parish church of Villiers-sur-Port, a village now extinct, it was abandoned in 1824 at the meeting of its parish at Huppain, then at Port-en-Bessin in 1972. The furniture, slates and frame were then recovered by the inhabitants, while the bell, hidden in a moat of the nearby castle by the Villierois, escaped the Portais. Despite its acquisition in 1876 by the Marquise of Mathan, concerned with its preservation, the building continued to deteriorate, despite some consolidation work carried out in the twentieth century. Its ruins, in stone and stone, preserve traces of Romanesque and Gothic vaults, as well as hagioscopes in the triumphal arch.

The architecture of the church reveals a variety of constructive techniques: a cradle vault for the porch under a bell tower, a vault for the choir, and an octagonal arrow made of cut stone. The modifications of the 17th and 18th centuries, such as the transformation of the nave gates or the repair of the triumphal arch, reflect liturgical or practical adaptations. After the Revolution, its decline accelerated with the abandonment of the designated cemetery and the transfer of its religious functions to Port-en-Bessin. Today, its ruins, protected since 1922, offer a poignant testimony to the medieval and modern history of Normandy.

The site is located to the south of the old village of Villiers-sur-Port, on the road to Manoir de Villiers, in a framework now integrated into the commune of Port-en-Bessin-Huppain. Its ranking among historic monuments underlines its heritage importance, despite its state of degradation. The sources, such as the works of Arcisse de Caumont in the 19th century or the data of the Merimée database, document its architectural evolution and its role in local community life, from its construction to its progressive abandonment.

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