Lisieux Cathedral (french: Cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Lisieux) is a
Catholic church located in
Lisieux,
France.
The present
cathedral was built between 1170 and the middle of the 13th century through the initiative of Bishop
Arnulf
Arnulf is a masculine German given name.
It is composed of the Germanic elements ''arn'' "eagle" and ''ulf'' "wolf".
The ''-ulf, -olf'' suffix was an extremely frequent element in Germanic onomastics and from an early time was perceived as a mere ...
. It was the seat of the
Bishop of Lisieux until the
diocese of Lisieux was abolished under the
Concordat of 1801 and merged into the
Diocese of Bayeux. The edifice is 110 meters and is a
national monument
A national monument is a monument constructed in order to commemorate something of importance to national heritage, such as a country's founding, independence, war, or the life and death of a historical figure.
The term may also refer to a spec ...
.
[ Ministère de la Culture]
Eglise Saint-Pierre, ancienne cathédrale
(''in French''), accessed 1 November 2022
The west front of the building consists of three portals surmounted by two towers. The south tower was built in the 16th century and at the top bears a 17th-century ''
flèche''. Buttresses were added to the south face in the 15th century. The cathedral survived
World War II wholly intact, although the town suffered Allied bombing in 1944.
From the outset, the architect designed quadripartite rib vaults and flying buttresses, making it one of Normandy’s first
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 ...
buildings. The
nave is fairly austere and is inspired by the Gothic architectural style of the
ÃŽle de France, whereas the most recent parts of the building were constructed in the 18th century (the
chevet
In architecture, an apse (plural apses; from Latin 'arch, vault' from Ancient Greek 'arch'; sometimes written apsis, plural apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome, also known as an ''exedra''. In ...
, the
lantern tower and the western façade) in Norman style.
An earlier cathedral is presumed to have existed since the 6th century, as there was a Bishop of Lisieux from that time, but nothing is known of the earlier edifice.
It is wrongly claimed that
Henry Plantagenet
Henry II (5 March 1133 – 6 July 1189), also known as Henry Curtmantle (french: link=no, Court-manteau), Henry FitzEmpress, or Henry Plantagenet, was King of England from 1154 until his death in 1189, and as such, was the first Angevin king ...
, Count of
Anjou, Duke of Normandy and future king of England, married
Eleanor of Aquitaine at the cathedral in 1152. In fact they married in
Poitiers Cathedral. Having been involved in the trial of
Joan of Arc,
Pierre Cauchon was named as Bishop of Lisieux in 1432 and is buried there.
File:Normandie Calvados Lisieux3 tango7174.jpg, Interior
File:Lisieux-Cathedrale.jpg, Apse
See also
*
List of Gothic Cathedrals in Europe
*
Basilica of Sainte-Thérèse, Lisieux
References
External links
Location
{{Catholic Church in France, state=collapsed
Churches in Calvados (department)
Lisieux
Former cathedrals in France
Churches completed in 1170
1170s establishments in France
12th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in France