Arles-sur-Tech : Sainte-Marie Abbey

According to tradition, the abbey was founded around 887 by a local count and was led by an abbot of the Order of Saint Benoît. Charlemagne put the monastery under his protection. He suffered looting during the Norman invasions and was rebuilt thanks to the Count of Barcelona. A papal bubble ensured the protection of the monastery. At the start, a modest building was to serve as a church, but thereafter, a more imposing building was built by Amelius Maurell and the priest Clodesinde, the latter being devoted unfinished in 1046. The construction of the cloister began in 1261 and ended in 1303. In 1592, the monastery was attached to the abbey of Saint-André de Sorède, and in 1722 associated with the bishopric of Perpignan. The church includes a central nave flanked by two vaulted stone aisles, to which are added chapels in warheads. The apse is circular, and a square bell tower rises to its right. The absidiles are closed by a flat wall at their entrance. The facade is embellished with Lombard arcades. The lintel of the door bears the inscription of the alpha and the omega. The eardrum is decorated with a Byzantine cross whose design refers to the vision of Saint John: in the center, in an oval mandorle, the blessed Christ with two raised fingers, while the symbols of the evangelists are present in the medallions at the ends of the cross. The cloister is irregular quadrilateral shape, with a number of arcades which varies on its sides (16-15-16-13). It consists of a gallery covered with a lean -to roof with an apparent frame, and in the four corners stand the walls of the old claustral buildings that have become private properties. The arcature of the cloister, that of the chapter room and the arcs in the corners are in white marble, while the other walls are made of mortar pebbles. A wrought iron cross was placed in the center of the cloister, while it was previously 400 meters from Arles-sur-Tech, on the road leading to Amélie-les-Bains.