Church of Our Lady of the Assumption, Gothic church in Grenade, France
The Church of Our Lady of the Assumption is a Southern Gothic brick church with a 14th-century pointed-arch portal of pale stone, its recessed colonnaded arches framing a trumeau figure between two grilled wooden doors. A 15th-century octagonal Toulouse-style bell tower with twin bays, pinnacles and a brick spire rises above. Inside, two rows of seven clustered pillars divide the nave into three vessels under pointed ribbed vaults, with eleven chapels between the buttresses.
Grandselve Abbey, which founded Grenade in 1290, initiated the church's construction in the 13th century. Pope Clement V visited the site in 1308, and work was completed in 1376. The building was classified as a monument historique in 1951.
The church keeps a set of canvases by 17th- and 18th-century Toulouse masters, brought from Grandselve Abbey after it was suppressed during the Revolution: the Flight into Egypt, the Wedding at Cana, the Presentation in the Temple, the Purification, Christ among the Doctors and Pentecost, all classified as historical monuments. Only the Presentation of Mary was restored, in 2010; long attributed to Antoine Rivalz, it may be by Antoine Sieye.
The main entrance is the 14th-century portal on the west facade, where the two wooden doors sit beneath a stone lintel; the nave is entered directly from there. The church lies in the centre of Grenade, in the Haute-Garonne department. The interior was largely fitted out in 19th-century restoration campaigns, so expect 19th-century furnishings alongside the medieval vaults.
The organ case is neo-Gothic, but the instrument is a patchwork: the original Grandselve organ was wrecked when the vaults and front wall collapsed in 1623. Aristide Cavaillé-Coll built the current organ in 1857, and his former pupil Jules Magen added the rear positive in 1867. Its instrumental part and three-manual console are listed as historical monuments.
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