Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The Protestant temple of Jarnac, located 16 Abel Guy Street, is the oldest reformed place of worship still in operation in the New Aquitaine region. Built in 1761 on the site of an old barn, it replaces a first temple destroyed in 1685 after the revocation of the edict of Nantes. This monument bears witness to the persistence of Protestantism in Charente, despite the persecutions suffered under Louis XIV.

The Jarnac region, marked by the influence of Jean Calvin in the 16th century, became a major Calvinist home. In 1558, Baron Guy I Chabot gave to the Protestants a building in ruins, transformed into the first temple. The Wars of Religion, notably the Battle of Jarnac in 1569, where Louis I of Bourbon-Condé died, reinforced tensions between Catholics and Huguenots. After the revocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685, the temple was razed, and Protestants gathered clandestinely.

In 1761, a "house of prayer" was established in the old barn of John Ranson, near the destroyed temple. Enlarged in 1821 by architect François-Nicolas Pineau, the building adopts a sober neo-classical facade, typical of reformed churches. In 1888, Albert Cochot rearranged the interior, adding an inverted vessel-shaped ceiling, stained glass windows and a marble mosaic. The Merklin organ, installed in 1901, is classified as a historical monument in 2011.

The temple plays a key role in the history of French Protestantism. In 1906, he hosted an assembly of pastors and lay people to reunite the Reformed Churches, leading to the creation of the Reformed Church of France in 1938. Today it belongs to the United Protestant Church of France and remains an active place of worship, linked to local economic history, including the trading of cognac.

The Delamain family, of Huguenote origin, illustrates this link between Protestantism and economic development. James Delamain, born in 1738 in Dublin, founded in 1763 a cognac trading house in Jarnac, still active today. The temple, with its woodwork, its pulpit to preach and its decalogue of 1694, maintains a sober and functional atmosphere, reflecting reformed values.

Ranked a historic monument in 1998, Jarnac Protestant temple embodies the resilience of a community to persecution. Its architecture and history make it a major religious and cultural heritage of the Charente, linked to figures such as François Mitterrand, born in an adjoining house in 1916.

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