Église Saint-Léger de Cheylade

About

The church of Saint-Léger de Cheylade, a small commune in the French department of Cantal in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, is a Romanesque religious building erected in the 12th century, ruined during the Hundred Years War, rebuilt and rebuilt several times between the 15th and 17th centuries, and retouched again in the 19th century. Consecrated to Léger d'Autun and dedicated to Catholic worship, the church has long belonged to the bishopric of Clermont but since the French Revolution depends on the diocese of Saint-Flour. Of modest design and dimensions, it is like many churches of the area built of volcanic stone, with a roof in lauze.

While the interior, almost without sculpted ornaments, has very little furniture or remarkable works of art, it is distinguished by a very original ceiling with wooden caissons: 1,360 squares painted probably in the eighteenth century of polychrome motifs, with a naive invoice but imbued with Christian symbols. These paintings, made on the three vaults by an anonymous artist, allowed in 1963 the classification of the church Saint-Léger de Cheylade to historical monuments.