Candes-Saint-Martin - Collégiale Saint-Martin

Candes-Saint-Martin lies at the confluence of the Vienne and the Loire and is considered to be the place where St Martin died in a monastery he founded himself in 397.

The pilgrimage church of Saint Martin stands on the site of the house where he died. Based on the architecture, sculptural decoration and iconography, it is likely that the collegiate church was donated around 1180 by King Henry II of England, who ruled the area at the time. It was built at the end of the 12th and beginning of the 13th century.

In response to the Hundred Years' War the church was fortified in the 15th century. The boundary between the territories controlled by the French and the English, which was shifting, passed not far from Candes in the first part of the 15th century. The towers flanking the façade and the other ones, at the north porch, had their summits taken up and crowned by machicolations. The fortified towers are connected by a patrol path that climbs the slopes of the roof.

A detail of the portal´s carvings