Collégiale Notre-Dame de Mehun-sur-Yèvre, Romanesque church in Mehun-sur-Yèvre, France.
Collégiale Notre-Dame is a Romanesque church in Mehun-sur-Yèvre featuring a horseshoe-shaped ambulatory around the choir and radiating chapels extending outward from the center. This architectural layout creates distinct spaces within the building and organizes the interior in a way that guides visitors through the structure.
The church was built in the early 11th century on the foundations of an ancient Roman fort and originally housed nine canons. Its construction marked a turning point in the town's development as a religious and administrative center.
The building displays Romanesque carved details including decorative brackets and a Paschal Lamb motif above the bell tower entrance. These ornaments give visitors a sense of the artistic traditions that shaped the town's appearance.
The church sits between the castle and the old town of Mehun-sur-Yèvre in the Cher department of the Centre-Val de Loire region. Visitors can reach it easily on foot since it is centrally positioned within the town and surrounded by local streets.
A passage running beneath the church was created in the 13th century to connect different elevation levels of the town. This underground route allowed people to move between upper and lower districts and survives as a hidden feature of how the medieval town was planned.
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