An unknown and lovely Romanesque chapel in southern Brittany
Only listed as a Historic Landmark in 1993, the Saint Gunthiern chapel hides at the deep end of a private property, near River Blavet and the hamlet of Locoyarn, not too far from the town of Hennebont in the département of Morbihan. No one knows it’s there, and I would like to thank Messrs. Jean-Pierre Henry and Emmanuel Jaffré for letting me access and photograph it.
The chapel first appears as modest; built in small to medium apparel, essentially with local pebbles, squared off as one could with little knowledge and imperfect tools, at the hands of people more used to sickle and scythe, working under the loose supervision of a simple mason. Only the corner stones and those framing the doors and the rare windows have been cut, the rest were simply put together with lots of mortar. Nevertheless, the construction is robust, even massive. It was built to last, and last it did for almost a thousand years, as the oldest parts are from the early 1000s, possibly even a little before Year 1000. Archaisms abound, as the photos will show.
The chapel is dedicated to the Welsh saint Gunthiern, come to live a hermit’s life on the island of Groix, off the coast of Morbihan. It is very interesting, as it features, in an extremely faithful manner (given the alterations of subsequent centuries), a Roman basilica floor plan with three naves, of a surprising size for a domus Dei so isolated nowadays. The choice of such a floor plan denotes an architectural culture and a historical background beyond that of the simple mason I mentioned above; therefore, we should not hesitate to add a qualified architect to the team, at least for the drawing of the plans.
Inside, if it seems possible to date the choir and the side walls to Year 1000 or so, it appears obvious that the walls above the high arches that separate the main nave from the aisles, have been remodeled later during the Romanesque Age: their apparel is of much better quality, allowing for the opening, maybe around 1120–50, of the high windows that did not exist earlier. Was this remodeling caused by structural deformations? It is possible, because although this church was, without a doubt, never vaulted, the triumphal arch has also been subjected to marked skewing, as the photos will also show. Generally, the reason behind such a phenomenon, when not the weight of the vault, would be unstable terrain.
The Saint Gunthiern chapel is sparsely decorated. One of the photos, featuring the eastern end of the southern aisle, gives a good idea of what this church looked like originally: simple and functional... with, however, unusual traces of sophistication, such as the engaged small column that stands right nearby, in sharp contrast with the rustic apsidiole and the widely splayed little window, so typical of what has been called “the First Romanesque Art”.
Likewise, the nave is devoid of any sculpted decor, but one can find, on one of the pillars, a naive and touching Crucifixion which transports us back through the night of times to the very early days of Christianity, including the positioning of the arms of Christ which are set in the traditional attitude of the very old “orants”, or praying figures...
Besides that naïve depiction, which attests to the purest faith, unmitigated by any æstheticism, the nave is bare, as one would expect —and here, I purposefully discard the two Romanesque capitals added later to support the triumphal arch. Except that... and in the same vein as the remark I made above about the slim engaged column next to the southern apsidiole, the easternmost row of the nave is punctuated by two surprising and very unusual square columns, cut in a beveled manner, with bases decorated with motifs more Pagan than anything else, and crowned by sculpted capitals featuring strange monsters or frieze-like geometric motifs...
Next to the other six pillars of the nave, those two demonstrate a level of originality and sophistication difficult to explain, as mysterious in their inspiration as they are in the technical expertise they required, which appears nowhere else in the monument, very far from that...
Showcased by the deep woods that surround it, this little chapel is a humble abode of God and a place of quiet meditation and prayer, but it also retains riddles to which we will never in this world know the answer...
General view of the chapel from the south-west.
An unknown and lovely Romanesque chapel in southern Brittany
Only listed as a Historic Landmark in 1993, the Saint Gunthiern chapel hides at the deep end of a private property, near River Blavet and the hamlet of Locoyarn, not too far from the town of Hennebont in the département of Morbihan. No one knows it’s there, and I would like to thank Messrs. Jean-Pierre Henry and Emmanuel Jaffré for letting me access and photograph it.
The chapel first appears as modest; built in small to medium apparel, essentially with local pebbles, squared off as one could with little knowledge and imperfect tools, at the hands of people more used to sickle and scythe, working under the loose supervision of a simple mason. Only the corner stones and those framing the doors and the rare windows have been cut, the rest were simply put together with lots of mortar. Nevertheless, the construction is robust, even massive. It was built to last, and last it did for almost a thousand years, as the oldest parts are from the early 1000s, possibly even a little before Year 1000. Archaisms abound, as the photos will show.
The chapel is dedicated to the Welsh saint Gunthiern, come to live a hermit’s life on the island of Groix, off the coast of Morbihan. It is very interesting, as it features, in an extremely faithful manner (given the alterations of subsequent centuries), a Roman basilica floor plan with three naves, of a surprising size for a domus Dei so isolated nowadays. The choice of such a floor plan denotes an architectural culture and a historical background beyond that of the simple mason I mentioned above; therefore, we should not hesitate to add a qualified architect to the team, at least for the drawing of the plans.
Inside, if it seems possible to date the choir and the side walls to Year 1000 or so, it appears obvious that the walls above the high arches that separate the main nave from the aisles, have been remodeled later during the Romanesque Age: their apparel is of much better quality, allowing for the opening, maybe around 1120–50, of the high windows that did not exist earlier. Was this remodeling caused by structural deformations? It is possible, because although this church was, without a doubt, never vaulted, the triumphal arch has also been subjected to marked skewing, as the photos will also show. Generally, the reason behind such a phenomenon, when not the weight of the vault, would be unstable terrain.
The Saint Gunthiern chapel is sparsely decorated. One of the photos, featuring the eastern end of the southern aisle, gives a good idea of what this church looked like originally: simple and functional... with, however, unusual traces of sophistication, such as the engaged small column that stands right nearby, in sharp contrast with the rustic apsidiole and the widely splayed little window, so typical of what has been called “the First Romanesque Art”.
Likewise, the nave is devoid of any sculpted decor, but one can find, on one of the pillars, a naive and touching Crucifixion which transports us back through the night of times to the very early days of Christianity, including the positioning of the arms of Christ which are set in the traditional attitude of the very old “orants”, or praying figures...
Besides that naïve depiction, which attests to the purest faith, unmitigated by any æstheticism, the nave is bare, as one would expect —and here, I purposefully discard the two Romanesque capitals added later to support the triumphal arch. Except that... and in the same vein as the remark I made above about the slim engaged column next to the southern apsidiole, the easternmost row of the nave is punctuated by two surprising and very unusual square columns, cut in a beveled manner, with bases decorated with motifs more Pagan than anything else, and crowned by sculpted capitals featuring strange monsters or frieze-like geometric motifs...
Next to the other six pillars of the nave, those two demonstrate a level of originality and sophistication difficult to explain, as mysterious in their inspiration as they are in the technical expertise they required, which appears nowhere else in the monument, very far from that...
Showcased by the deep woods that surround it, this little chapel is a humble abode of God and a place of quiet meditation and prayer, but it also retains riddles to which we will never in this world know the answer...
General view of the chapel from the south-west.