Aerial view of the Church
On top of the city

Visited March 26, 2000

Notre Dame de la Garde

The city started at the harbor and expanded Eastward, climbing steep limestone hills about 2500 feet high. We did somewhat the same but took a few buses and subways.

After lunch we saw two major Marseille works by the Provence architect Henri Esperandieu: a beautiful waterworks and a basilica.

We took the bus up the steep hills South of the old harbor to the 500 foot high site of the Basilique de Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde. The site is more one better suited to a fort than to a church for people like the French who seize on any excuse to stay home on Sundays. Like the major cathedral in town, this was built in the mid 19th century in the then fashionable Romano-Byzantine style with its alternating bands of light and dark stone. (Parisians got a similarly built church about the same time on a similar hill with a commanding view of the city. We call our Montmartan church the Basilica of Sacre Coeur).

Here's an outside view showing its fort-like appearance:

Looking up at the church

And, in fact, the route to the main door is protected by this drawbridge:

Drawbridge

We asked Pietrina to protect the door as well and she did a pretty good job for a former fashion model:

Pietrina and the door

Here's a view of the tower:

Looking up the tower

Inside

Inside the architecture is consistent with the outside with its alternating horizontal rows reminiscent of the cathedrals in Siena and Pisa:

The nave

What little there is of the apse

Here's a view of the domes from the inside with the gold ceramic decorations:

inside the dome

Here's a picture of a reliquary carried by angels from the inside of this place:

The reliquary

Looking Down

From the basilica's commanding heights, the views are spectacular. Here's a shot of the new harbor rising beyond the town's cathedral in the middle right of the picture

harbor view

Descent

Coming down from the steep hill, one sees Fort St. Nicholas still guarding the port.

Fort Nicolas

St. Victor's

Nearby is the Basilque St-Victor, a relic of the abbey dedicated to the patron saint of sailors. This is pretty much a fort from the outside, as it had to be in the 11th century when it was built. While we were there, it was taking a beating from young boys using it to return their soccer ball:

An old rebounding wall

Here's the doorway to that old church much closer:

Entry

Inside the nave is 13th century primitive gothic:

St. Victor's Nave

Here's its ceiling:

St. Victor's Ceiling

The apse was built about a 100 years later but the main altar is, like the rest of us, from the 1960s and so not quite as good:

Apse

Town scene

Nearby is this square which suggests that sailors don't spend all of their time praying to St. Victor:

Staying one step ahead of him

Next we took the fine Marseille subway eastward to see the other Henri Esperandieu edifice called the Palais Longchamp. Here's a sneak preview:

Palais Longchamp

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