Bazas Cathedral (french: Cathédrale Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Bazas) is a

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

located in

Bazas Bazas (; oc-gsc, Vasats) is a commune in the Gironde department in southwestern France. Geography Bazas stands on a narrow promontory above the Beuve valley 60 km/37 mi southeast of Bordeaux and 40 km/25 mi southwest of ...

, Gironde,

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. The

cathedral A cathedral is a church that contains the '' cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denominatio ...

is a national

monument A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, hist ...

. Bazas was the seat of the Bishop of Bazas until the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

(after which it was not restored but was instead, by the

Concordat of 1801 The Concordat of 1801 was an agreement between Napoleon Bonaparte and Pope Pius VII, signed on 15 July 1801 in Paris. It remained in effect until 1905, except in Alsace-Lorraine, where it remains in force. It sought national reconciliation ...

, divided between the dioceses of Bordeaux,

Agen The commune of Agen (, ; ) is the prefecture of the Lot-et-Garonne department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine, southwestern France. It lies on the river Garonne southeast of Bordeaux. Geography The city of Agen lies in the southwestern department ...

and

Aire Aire may refer to: Music * ''Aire'' (Yuri album), 1987 * ''Aire'' (Pablo Ruiz album), 1997 *''Aire (Versión Día)'', an album by Jesse & Joy Places *Aire-sur-la-Lys, a town in the Pas-de-Calais département in France *Aire-la-Ville, a municip ...

) and its main attraction is still the cathedral dedicated to

Saint John the Baptist John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...

, so named because the blood of John the Baptist was venerated here. The cathedral dominates the town and stands at the east end of a wide, open space called the parvis. The cathedral dates mainly from the 13th-14th centuries, and was built on the model of the great

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

cathedrals of northern France. The west front is unique with its three noticeable levels: the first includes the three Gothic portals retaining part of their original 13th-century sculpture; the second includes the rose window from 1537; and the third is a Neoclassical gable from 1723. The belfry on the north is part 11th century up to the openings. The interior consists of a long, narrow nave, with no transept, and was entirely rebuilt from 1583 to 1635 after the

Huguenots The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

badly damaged it in 1561 during the

Wars of Religion A religious war or a war of religion, sometimes also known as a holy war ( la, sanctum bellum), is a war which is primarily caused or justified by differences in religion. In the modern period, there are frequent debates over the extent to wh ...

. The cathedral is part of the

World Heritage Sites of the Routes of Santiago de Compostela in France UNESCO designated the Routes of Santiago de Compostela in France as a World Heritage Site in December 1998. The routes pass through the following regions of France: Aquitaine, Auvergne, Basse-Normandie, Bourgogne, Centre, Champagne-Ardenne, Ile-d ...

.868 - Chemins de Saint-Jacques de Compostelle en France
Unesco, 2016.

References

External links

Location

Churches in Gironde World Heritage Sites in France Monuments historiques of Gironde {{France-RC-church-stub