bell gable, Pas de Bres, ArdècheA common feature of Romanesque churches in south-central France is the bell gable. These constructions may have stacked rows of “eyes” in other regions, but in south central France, I have never seen any. All the ones pictured here are single level. While these gables may have 4 or more eyes on a single row, the eyes are not all necessarily equipped with bells.
bell gable, Naves, Ardèche
bell gable, Saint-Julien-de-Tournel, Lozère
bell gable, Sablières, Ardèche
bell gable, Planzolles, Ardèche
bell gable, Laboule, Ardèche
bell gable, Pas-de-Bres, Ardèche
bell gable, St-Jean-de-Pourcharesse, Ardèche
bell gable, Naves, Ardèche
So why build a bell gable instead of a bell tower ? Possibly because the weight of a tower would be too much for the vaulted roof of the Romanesque church. Here are some of the more interesting churches seen while walking in the region. Most of the churches are in local stone, ranging from limestone to schist. But the most interesting church is in Pas-de-Bres in the Ardeche – built from very unusual red sandstone. Next hiking challenge : find the red sandstone quarry.
This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
You can adjust cookie settings by navigating the tabs on the left hand side.
Strictly Necessary Cookies
Strictly Necessary Cookies must be enabled at all times to permit the site to function properly.
These cookies include a cookie to record your language preference, cookies to permit the use of Google maps programming interfaces and maps, and cookies to permit the use of OpenStreetMap maps on this site.
If you disable these cookies, we will not be able to remember your language preferences.
3rd Party Cookies
This website uses the Matomo web analytics platform to measure site activity. Matomo places cookies in your browser to collect information such as visitor language, device type, time and duration of visit, pages viewed, downloads etc. None of this data can identify you personally. The collected data is retained on a server located in France, owned and operated by the owner of this website. The collected data is not used for advertising and is not shared with third parties.
Please enable Strictly Necessary Cookies first so that we can save your preferences!