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Origin and history

Saint Croix de Sauveterre Church, located in the Tarn department in Occitanie, is a Catholic religious building built in the 18th century. It occupies the site of an old castral chapel, backed by a castle with a tower used as a bell tower. The building, rebuilt after the destruction of the Wars of Religion, was thoroughly renovated in the 19th century, including the addition of a vault in 1861 and neo-Gothic murals.

The church houses burials of the Auxillon family, linked to local history, and retains direct access to the castle. Its architecture combines schist bellows, molasses blocks and sandstone frames, with a three-span nave vaulted ridges and a semicircular apse facing west. The painted decor of the abside depicts episodes of the True Cross, while the lateral chapels, covered with arches, present geometrical motifs of neo-Gothic inspiration.

Ranked a historic monument in 2002, the church is the result of a reconstruction dated the 3rd quarter of the 18th century, according to the architectural characteristics observed. The archives refer to a state of prolonged degradation prior to its renovation, although the exact date of 1761, advanced by historian H. Crozes, remains unwieldy. The sacristy, built at the end of the 19th century in the first span of the nave, bears witness to the subsequent transformations of the building.

Originally, the site housed a castral chapel built into the castle's defensive system. The links between the church and the castle, such as common access and the reuse of medieval structures, underline its central role in parish and seigneurial life. The destructions associated with the Wars of Religion marked its history, leading to an almost total reconstruction, whose current architectural traces date mostly from the eighteenth century.

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