The cathedral of Le Puy–en–Velay #2
The cathedral of Le Puy-en-Velay in Auvergne (central France) is one of the major Romanesque buildings of the Middle Ages and of the Western World. Built between the late 1000s and the mid-1200s, it is a UNESCO World heritage monument.
There would be so much to say about this magnificent church that I’d rather refer those people interested to the Wikipedia page, which is reasonably detailed: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Puy_Cathedral.
I will upload several other photos of my last visit to the cathedral over the following days.
This is easily the most intriguing artifact inside the cathedral: it is a black basalt polished stone table, roughly 3 × 2 meters, which is rumored to have been the top part of a dolmen (this is Breton language for “table of stone”) that had existed since time immemorial on the hilltop where the original cathedral was built when Christendom took over. Its name is The Stone of Fevers, because as legend would have it, lying on it helped cure fever-related illnesses.
One still often sees bona fide (no pun intended) believers lying face down on this stone for minutes to, I suppose, pray, or maybe just meditate. I even saw a nun doing it once! This is a rare place where one can actually see nowadays the interconnection between pagan and Christian rites.
Panorama shot made up of 2 separate handheld exposures, stitched with PT Gui.
The cathedral of Le Puy–en–Velay #2
The cathedral of Le Puy-en-Velay in Auvergne (central France) is one of the major Romanesque buildings of the Middle Ages and of the Western World. Built between the late 1000s and the mid-1200s, it is a UNESCO World heritage monument.
There would be so much to say about this magnificent church that I’d rather refer those people interested to the Wikipedia page, which is reasonably detailed: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Puy_Cathedral.
I will upload several other photos of my last visit to the cathedral over the following days.
This is easily the most intriguing artifact inside the cathedral: it is a black basalt polished stone table, roughly 3 × 2 meters, which is rumored to have been the top part of a dolmen (this is Breton language for “table of stone”) that had existed since time immemorial on the hilltop where the original cathedral was built when Christendom took over. Its name is The Stone of Fevers, because as legend would have it, lying on it helped cure fever-related illnesses.
One still often sees bona fide (no pun intended) believers lying face down on this stone for minutes to, I suppose, pray, or maybe just meditate. I even saw a nun doing it once! This is a rare place where one can actually see nowadays the interconnection between pagan and Christian rites.
Panorama shot made up of 2 separate handheld exposures, stitched with PT Gui.