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In a lateral chapel is a hole in the vault, through which the ropes passed to pull the bells that were hung in a tower above, but which has been destroyed. In 1450 Aubeterre was in the possession of the English, and they sold it to the Count of Perigord.
The spectator who is at all interested in ecclesiastical architecture will examine with much delight the elaborate mouldings and the strangely-suggestive forms of men, beasts, birds, shapes fantastic and chimerical, which ornament these Romanesque doorways. But this church has not the interest of singularity which belongs to another at Aubeterre that of St. John.
For centuries not this yard only, nor the two charnel-houses but also the floor of the church, have served as the burial-place of the citizens of Aubeterre, and the floor is raised four feet above that of the apse though frequent interments. The last head cross I noted within the church bore the date 1860. The height of the church is said to be fifty feet.
On the opposite side is a high gallery cut in the rock in imitation of the triforium gallery. The row of piers separates the church proper from what was for centuries the cemetery of Aubeterre: a vast burrow made by the living for the reception of the dead, where they were plunged out of the sunlight teeming with earthly illusion and phantasy, to await the breaking of the great dawn.
The castle occupied a height cut off from the town by a deep cleft, that has its sides pierced with caverns, and its store chambers and cellars are dug out of the rock. But the most curious feature of Aubeterre is the monolithic church of S. John beneath the castle.
By the valley of the Dronne all movement of troops from the Limousin and Perigord into the Saintonge took place, and the rock of Aubeterre was considered of so great military importance that a strong castle was constructed on the summit, and its possession was contested repeatedly during the Hundred Years' War and the wars of religion.
All the heads came up together, and the rest went down. We walked into a riverside inn, and there I made friends with the innkeeper over one or two bottles of beer there was an innocent liquor so called on sale at Aubeterre.
Over the door is a mask carved in the stone and a little window; above the monolithic church, standing on the platform of rock, is the exquisite flamboyant spire, not communicating with the church beneath, also a modern salle de danse. Another subterranean church as interesting but not as well preserved is that of Aubeterre in Charente, on the Dronne.
The aubergiste was rather down on his luck, for some mill at which he had been employed had gone wrong financially, and the wheels thought it no longer worth while to turn round. He therefore undertook to show us the way to everything that ought to be seen at Aubeterre.
In 1561 he was back again in Aubeterre, and converted the monolithic church into a preaching "temple," sweeping away all Catholic symbols, and it remains bare of them to this day. His brother, Guy Bonchard, Bishop of Perigueux, was also an ardent Calvinist, and used his position for introducing preachers of the sect into the churches.
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