Basilique St-Urbain

Basilique St-Urbain Review

Built between 1262 and 1286 by Pope Urban IV (who was born in Troyes), St-Urbain is one of the most remarkable churches in France, a perfect culmination of the Gothic quest to replace stone walls with stained glass. Its narrow porch frames a 13th-century Last Judgment tympanum, whose highly worked elements include a frieze of the dead rising out of their coffins (note the grimacing skeleton) and an enormous crayfish, a testament to the local river culture. Inside, a chapel on the south side houses the Vièrge au Raisin (Virgin with Grapes), clutching Jesus with one hand and a bunch of champagne grapes in the other.