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Eglise St-Trophime Review

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Église St-Trophime

Address: Pl. de la République, Arles

Category: Religious Sites
Location: Arles

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Fodor's Review:

Classed as a world treasure by UNESCO, this extraordinary Romanesque church alone would justify a visit to Arles, though it's continually upstaged by the antiquities around it. Its transepts date from the 11th century and its nave from the 12th; the church's austere symmetry and ancient artworks (including a stunningly Roman-style 4th-century sarcophagus) are fascinating in themselves. But it is the church's 12th-century portal —its entry facade—that earns it international respect. Superbly preserved and restored sculptures with high-relief modeling, complex layers of drapery, and a detail of expression that are nearly classical embellish every inch of the portal's surface. Indeed, it is that classicism that marks it as late Romanesque; Chartres Cathedral, of the same era, had long since ventured into fluid Gothicism. The tympanum (the half-moon over the door) tells the story of the Last Judgment, inherently symmetrical, with its separation of the blessed who surge toward Christ and the damned who skulk, naked and in chains, toward hell. Christ is flanked by his chroniclers, the evangelists: the eagle (John), the bull (Luke), the angel (Matthew), and the lion (Mark).

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