Viam () is a commune in the Corrèze

department Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

in central France. The village is positioned on a lake, used for swimming, fishing, water-skiing, canoeing, kayaking, sailing and land activities such as hiking and cycling.

Geography

Viam is a commune in the Massif Central located on the Plateau de Millevaches. The commune is also located in the ''parc naturel régional de Millevaches en Limousin'' (Regional Nature Park of Millevaches in the Limousin).

Population

History

The earliest human traces go back to the Neolithic period. Two polished axes and carved flints were discovered at six locations. In the Gallo-Roman period, a route from

Limoges Limoges (, , ; oc, Lemòtges, locally ) is a city and Communes of France, commune, and the prefecture of the Haute-Vienne Departments of France, department in west-central France. It was the administrative capital of the former Limousin region ...

crossed the commune. Seven sites have remains of Gallo-Roman construction, the most important occupying the ''Plateau du Domaine de Plazanet'' where a double column was uncovered. Two cremated burial sites were discovered nearby. One, dated to the 1st century A.D., rested under a 15 metre diameter mound of earth. The other, consisting of a granite burial chest, dates from the end of the 2nd century. Another special burial chest includes three receptacles. The parish of Viam seems to originate from the year 1000. In 1154, a bull from

Pope Adrian IV Pope Adrian IV ( la, Adrianus IV; born Nicholas Breakspear (or Brekespear); 1 September 1159, also Hadrian IV), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 4 December 1154 to his death in 1159. He is the only Englishman t ...

, confirms the church as the property of the

Abbey of Tulle The Roman Catholic Diocese of Tulle (Latin: ''Dioecesis Tutelensis''; French: ''Diocèse de Tulle'') is a Roman Catholic diocese in Tulle, France. The diocese of Tulle comprises the whole ''département'' of Corrèze. The Abbey of Tulle was found ...

. In the village of Plazanet, sixteen silos, divided into three groups, belonging to a farm of that time. Near the village of Monceaux, the remains of a castle occupy a promontory dominating the

Vézère The Vézère (; oc, Vesera) is a 211-km-long river in southwestern France. It is an important tributary to the Dordogne. Its source is in the northwestern part of the elevated plateau known as the Massif Central. It flows into the Dordogne near ...

river. In 1514, a Laurent de Monceaux was a curate at Viam. In the middle of the 14th century, the Château de Monceaux, owned by the Lord Murat de Tarnac, was sold to the Comte family, a middle-class family in Treignac and elevated to the nobility thereafter. At the end of the seventeenth century, the coat of arms of Sir Pierre Comte of Monceaux de Viam was blazoned with ''d'argent à un arbre de sinople''.

Places and monuments

Église de Viam

The parish church of Viam was probably built in the 12th century, as mentioned in its general structure. It is built on a rocky headland, all its walls resting on it. Well situated, it dominates the lake, the village square and the surrounding buildings. Essentially Romanesque, with thick walls, narrow openings on the south side, a half-circular apse, quite rare in the Corrèze and

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal jutting from a wall to carry a superincumbent weight, a type of bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in the wall, whereas a console is a piece applied to the s ...

s of different profiles reign under the

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

. The interior building is 22m long, and the width and the average height are 5m. The church is composed of a single nave, three bays and six columns, including the marquees are adorned with stylised volutes, of Gothic art. The original ceiling was made of wood, as in many Romanesque churches of their time, but in the 13th and 14th centuries, it was replaced by a Gothic-style stone vault with crossed ogival arches. At the time the church was revamped, a Gothic style is also found on the main entrance and the right side door. The two-level steeple-wall is flanked by an imposing buttress. On its upper part, there is a double arched arcade in which two bells hang. One, dating back to 1581, weighs 120 kg. The other, weighing 245 kg, dates from 1866. The entrance porch has a semi-circular tympanum; it is topped by a triangular pediment in a lesser relief that houses a shell. The Church of Saint-Martin was classified as a historic monument in 1976.

Buildings

Throughout the territory of the commune of Viam, there are many crosses, often in granite in various forms. The house of Valentin Didey and Eugène Leblanc is located by the lake.

Dam

The

EDF EDF may refer to: Organisations * Eclaireurs de France, a French Scouting association * Education for Development Foundation, a Thai charity * Électricité de France, a French energy company ** EDF Energy, their British subsidiary ** EDF Luminus, ...

dam of Monceaux-La-Virole was built on the Vézère River. Construction work on the dam began in 1940. The area was filled with water in 1946. Details: * Dam height on foundations: 34 m * Lake area: 183 ha * Holding Volume (maximum shore): 20 million m³ * Normal river flow rate: 6.7 m³/s * Maximum river flow rate: 140 m³/s * Water intake: 13 m³/s

Notable people

Richard Millet Richard Millet (born 1953) is a Lebanese-French author. Biography Early life He was born in Viam, Corrèze in 1953. He spent part of his childhood in the neighborhood of Badaro in Beirut, Lebanon. Work and career In 1994, he won the Essay ...

* Geneviève Fourgnaud,

painter Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

References

{{authority control Communes of Corrèze Corrèze communes articles needing translation from French Wikipedia