Chapelle Saint Gabriel

A masterpiece of Southern Romanesque art, the chapel offers visitors a richly sculpted exterior that has yet to reveal all its mysteries. As early as the First Iron Age, populations settled on the hill, where the foundations of huts have been unearthed. In fact, the site was occupied from the 2nd century B.C. to the Late Antique period by a settlement that reached its maximum extension in the 1st century B.C. The façade of the Saint-Gabriel chapel is inspired by Late Roman decorations. Its oculus is dated 1180 by comparison with the voussure of the western portal of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux cathedral. In the upper part, an original archivolt surrounds an oculus decorated with leaves and masks, and flanked by the symbols of the four evangelists: John (the eagle), Matthew (the man), Luke (the bull) and Mark (the lion), whose layout (with John's symbol at the top) is reminiscent of the Carolingian period. The lower part is a tribute to Saint Gabriel. A large arch houses the door, framed by two columns surmounted by a triangular pediment on which rests the Paschal Lamb. The triangular pediment rests on two columns whose Corinthian capitals, adorned with two rows of acanthus leaves, can still be admired today. The sculpted scene on the pediment depicts the Annunciation with Mary and Archangel Gabriel on the left, and Mary and Elizabeth embracing on the right. The figures are set against an architectural backdrop of three arches. Above the entrance door, on the semi-circular tympanum, the angel Gabriel towers over the scene of Daniel thrown to the wild beasts on the left, and Adam and Eve at the moment of original sin on the right. The interior of the chapel is very simple, with a single nave divided into three vaulted bays ending in a circular apse. A funerary inscription in tribute to Marcus Frontonus Eupor by his wife Julia Nice reads as follows: "Aux Mânes de Marcus Frontonius Euporus, sévir augustal - un des six plus anciens membres du collège de la colonie Julia Augusta des eaux sextiennes (Aix), batelier marin d'Arles patron des mariniers des Durances et de la corporation des utriculaires d'Ernaginum". The existence of this inscription proves that the site was the base of a guild of utriculars, who transported goods on rafts supported by inflated oysters (uter = wineskin). The chapel's apse is pentagonal on the outside, with massive pillars underpinning the interior double arches. The building is remarkable for its proportions. On the first buttress, a sundial is still visible: a dial reduced to the canonical hours that punctuated the parishioner's and worker's day (tierce, sexte and none).