Cossé-en-Champagne

ARCHEOLOGY OF MURAL PAINTINGS

Cossé: Saint Blaise

Cossé-en-Champagne is a small village in the département of Mayenne. Its church, dating back to the 11^th and 12^th centuries, is dedicated to the Virgin and to Saint Blaise. The choir is Gothic but the nave has not undergone too many alterations since the 12^thcentury. This Romanesque church is particularly interesting because it enables us to see "live" how mural paintings that had been forgotten for centuries are being rediscovered. It is extremely moving to see a face, a figure, reappearing under the greyish coating of plaster, allowing us to go back in time, six, seven or eight centuries.

There are several reasons why Romanesque mural paintings were forgotten for so long. After the 13^th century they were often covered with new paintings corrresponding to the new tastes and theological concepts of an evolving Church. Later, the new paintings themselves were either destroyed or covered with whitewash or plaster. Beneath the plaster four or five different painting campaigns are sometimes found. Often, these "frescoes" (see glossary) are discovered by chance during restoration work. More and more often the walls are carefully probed to see what lies beneath the plaster. A small "window" is cut through the plaster before beginning more important clearing work.

Two heads visible again after 4 or 5 centuries

The oldest painting discovered so far is a masonry pattern of dressed stones dating to the 13^th century ( joints are painted on the whitewash to simulate courses of large dressed stones)

THE WALL PAINTINGS

Two years later, in July 2004, the paintings of the chapel dedicated to St Anne were uncovered. Under 37 different layers, 15th-century wall paintings have been revealed and stabilized. The most remarkable and legible scenes are: a Parousia, a concert of musician angels and various representations of the lives of saints