Église Saint-Félix de Ropidera, Romanesque church in Ropidera, France.
Église Saint-Félix de Ropidera is a ruined single-nave Romanesque church, 15 m long and 5 m wide, with a semicircular apse at the east end. The nave vault has collapsed, and the south wall, which held the entrance door, has largely fallen. The apse keeps part of its cul-de-four vault and two round-arched windows, with a 17 cm relief frieze running above them inside.
Ropidera is documented from 955 and as a villa in 1011; the church of Sant Feliu first appears in a text of 1204, and the present building was raised in the 12th century. After the 1258 Treaty of Corbeil brought the French border close, a watchtower about 15 metres high was built over the apse around 1300. The village was abandoned in the 15th century, yet a chaplain was still appointed in 1570 and the benefice yielded income into the 18th century.
The church is also called Sant Feliu de les Cases, after the old parish of Ropidera, which was known as les Cases ("the houses"); French forms such as Saint-Félix de Roupidère also appear in documents. It is dedicated to Felix of Girona, and a 1356 text names it Saint-Pierre and Saint-Félix.
Access requires climbing steep mountain paths and careful footing, as the church sits on sloped terrain above the river. Sturdy footwear is essential, and visitors should expect limited visibility in certain areas due to the building's deteriorated state.
The tower over the apse was built around 1300, after the 1258 Treaty of Corbeil moved the border between the Crown of Aragon and the Kingdom of France close to Ropidera. Its construction blocked the apse windows, and a 15 m corner of it still stands, visible from the Têt valley and the RN 116.
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