BRAIN-SUR-L'AUTHION - Saint-Pierre Church Ancient parts listed as Historic Monuments The parish is mentioned as early as the 8th century. At the head of the church, a Merovingian necropolis is attested. The old parts of the church include the Romanesque bell tower and the span located at its base, the old Gothic choir with flat bedside that follows it and the chapel of the Virgin which flanks them to the south (right). The trace of the foundations of the Romanesque apse is materialized in the tiling of the north chapel (left) in the background of the church. The bell tower dates from the 12th century. Its stocky silhouette bears a slate spire that emerges from the roofs of the nave and the south chapel. The façade of the church is decorated with a portico inspired by Greco-Roman antiquity, typical of the architectural vocabulary of François-Villers. The increase in population following the boom of the agricultural economy in the first half of the 19th century led to the construction in 1839 of a new nave that was larger than the medieval one, which was much narrower (the span under the bell tower and the old choir were placed in its axis, while they are now shifted to the left.) The author of this new and large single nave is the Angevin architect Jacques-Louis François-Villers. Very simple, it is covered with a false plaster vault. The facade is decorated with a portico inspired by Greco-Roman antiquity. In the bay under the bell tower, the four columns housed in the corners are of Romanesque origin but their capitals, decorated with foliage, were taken back at the beginning of the thirteenth century, when the vault was built. The remains of a funerary litre 1 are still visible on two columns. The old chancel is covered with a vault of thirteenth-century ogives with fine ribs whose intersections are adorned with carved keys representing angels surrounding the mystical Lamb. The vault still bears a painted decoration of the eighteenth century. Along the walls, the ribs fell back on niches with canopies once intended to house statues-columns. This architecture is typical of the Gothic style known as «Angevin» or «Plantagenêt», characterized by the use of domed vaults and multiple ribs. On the south side of the bay under the bell tower takes place a chapel built in the sixteenth century, and dedicated to the Virgin of the Rosary. The stained glass windows are from the Angers Bordereau workshop, and date from the early twentieth century. The main altar located in the back of the nave is framed by two 17th century tufa statues representing Saint Aignan, former patron of the church, and Saint Pierre wearing his papal tiara. Above the altar, the wooden cross of Christ dates from the 18th century. In a niche set up in an old bay of the bell tower is installed an 18th century terracotta statue representing Saint Sebastian. On the right side of the nave, we can admire a very beautiful statue of the Virgin with the Child, perhaps in terracotta, from the end of the sixteenth century. The chapel of the Virgin was once called «chapel of bribes» because until the middle of the nineteenth century many faithful offered to the altar of the Blessed Virgin their first products in flax, hemp, fruits or butter. According to an old custom, on the day of their marriage, young girls would come and pray to the Virgin and take a pin loaded with linen or hemp that was next to the altar. They were spinning, and the yarn obtained was sold for the maintenance of the chapel. The girls who could not run made an offering of money. 1-Black band painted on the walls of the church and bearing the coat of arms of the deceased lord A little further down Rue du Presbytère, you can admire the Grange de l'Hôpitaux.

Address
Grande Rue, 49800 Brain - sur - l'Authion, Maine-et-Loire, Pays de la Loire, France