Collégiale Notre-Dame de Villefranche-de-Rouergue, Gothic church in Villefranche-de-Rouergue, France.
The Collegiate Church of Notre-Dame is a Gothic church on Place Notre-Dame in Villefranche-de-Rouergue. It has a single nave flanked by side chapels and a monumental west bell tower with a large pointed archway at its base. The tower rises in stacked stone sections with a balustrade and paired lancet windows.
Construction of the church began in the Middle Ages and continued over several centuries with repeated interruptions. Wars and epidemics delayed the work, shaping the gradual evolution of the building.
The church became a collegiate foundation in 1447 by a bull of Pope Nicholas V, and its choir stalls were carved between 1473 and 1487 by André Sulpice de Marvejols. Huguenots plundered the building in 1561. The main organ, behind a Gothic case, keeps registers dating from 1537, 1626 and 1675.
The church stands on the Place Notre-Dame, its monumental bell tower rising over the street that passes in front of the west facade. The tower was left unfinished, so its upper section stops short of a spire. Enter through the west porch to reach the single nave, lined with side chapels.
The west tower was never finished: begun in the second half of the 15th century in Flamboyant Gothic style, it rises above a porch straddling the street, and its upper section was truncated when the bells were moved there. The main organ, behind a Gothic case, keeps registers dating from 1537, 1626 and 1675.
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