Cornerstones
Situated in a most pleasant region of France, Saulieu is a small town around 45 miles west of Dijon. Its church of Saint Andoche is believed to trace its foundation to the early years of the fourth century A.D., when the original building on the site was built to contain the relics of Sts. Andoche, Thyrse, and Felix.
The priest Andoche and his deacon, Thyrse, were sent by St. Polycarp of Smyrna (who had known the Apostle John) to Gaul. After evangelizing Autun (then the Roman Augustodunum), they moved to join a Christian merchant named Felix in Saulieu, where the three were martyred in 177.
A Saracen raid destroyed the original church in 747; the emperor Charlemagne financed rebuilding, but more raids caused further damage, so that the church was rebuilt by Stephen de Bagé, Bishop of Autun, and was consecrated by Pope Callistus II in the year 1119.
This church was badly damaged by English soldiers in 1359, during the Hundred Years’ War, with only the nave surviving; the Avignon Pope Urban V offered an indulgence in 1364 to those who gave alms toward its reconstruction, but neither this nor a later indulgence of Pope Clement VII in 1584 had the desired result, and it was not until 1704 that there was a reconstruction.
That was not the end of the sufferings of the church of Saulieu, as the French Revolution caused further damage, notably to the portal. Truly, half a century ago, Zodiaque magazine was correct to describe the church of Saint Andoche, Saulieu, as “église martyre.”
The surviving nave is quite remarkable, with its vigorously carved capitals to the Romanesque arcades. They feature a mixture of biblical subjects and animals (not forgetting two owls) and are roughly contemporary with those at nearby Autun, dating from the first half of the 12th century.
The scriptural subjects are a varied and compelling combination, perhaps the finest (1) being the Old Testament scene of Balaam and his ass (Num. 22:22-35). The false prophet rides his donkey, and round the corner is the Angel (with raised sword), whom the donkey saw, but Balaam could not. Balaam is caricatured as a monk wearing a habit and cowl.
Subjects from the Gospels include the flight into Egypt (Matt. 2:13-23). Joseph, wearing a turban, leads the donkey (which is on wheels) bearing the Virgin Mary, who protectively clutches her Son (2). Then there’s the Temptation of Christ (Matt. 4:3-4; Luke 4:3-4), when Satan presents a big round stone (3) with the words “If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.”
In reply, Christ points to the biblical text of his reply: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” Behind Christ is the figure of one of the angels who came and ministered to him (Matt. 4:11).
Satan appears again in the suicide of Judas (4), in which the Devil pulls on a rope to which the moneybag is attached (Matt. 27:5). Another capital (5) features the holy women en route to the Easter tomb; Mary Magdalene, clutching her jar of ointment, encounters the risen Christ (“noli me tangere”; John 20:14-17). The sculptor has captured a very spiritualized face of Christ.
The building has many other interesting features, like the sarcophagus of St. Andoche under the altar, and a variety of medieval statues, including two of St. Roch, but it is the Romanesque for which you remember Saulieu.
Reading:
- Georges Barbier, Martyre de Saulieu, Zodiaque magazine, Numero 24, 1955.
- Jean Baudry et al., Bourgogne Romane, Zodiaque (various editions).
Dr. Simon Cotton is honorary senior lecturer in chemistry at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. and a former churchwarden of St. Giles, Norwich, and St. Jude, Peterborough. He is a member of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham.
