Saint-Jean Baptiste church in Saint-Jean d'Angle

The church of Saint Jean Baptiste of Saint Jean d'Angle was in the diocese of Saintes. It was originally a priory church. The nuns were to live in contiguous buildings. The priory probably extended beyond the present road, drawn to the west in 1828. The primitive Romanesque building is mentioned as early as 1047. Built in the 12th century, the crossing of the transept surmounted by an elliptic dome on a trunk is still in place. The nave then had three spans as evidenced by the two small buttresses still visible on the south facade. At the beginning of the 13th century, the village of St Jean d'Angle enjoyed a great prosperity thanks to the salt trade. The buildings of the priory were rebuilt at that time. In the first half of the 13th century, the Romanesque church was given a Gothic choir, which was subsequently extended at the end of the century by two chapels north and south. A distinct campaign of construction took place after thedestructions of the Hundred Years War. The edifice remained for a long time in ruins. A new bell tower was erected on the stump of the old bell-tower, still visible in the attic. In the 14th century, the South and West walls were consolidated and reinforced with buttresses and a porch erected on the western façade. It is the last of the great bell towers built on the coastal area at that time. One observes in the masonry the date of 1611. The building, built of cut stone and covered with hollow tiles, has approximately a rectangular plan widened to the south of the choir of a chapel of two bays. The choir and the steeple span form a fairly homogeneous ensemble which houses the sanctuary. The southern chapel is also a very clear vessel receiving abundant light.

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