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Behind a severe, fortress like wall of brick and a towering octagonal belfry, the Couvent des Jacobins hides one of the most breathtaking interiors in France. It was the mother church of the Dominican order, the preaching friars founded in Toulouse in 1215 by Saint Dominic to counter the Cathar faith, and construction of the great hall began in 1230. Its most astonishing feature stands at the eastern end, where a single slender column sends twenty two stone ribs fanning across the vault nearly twenty eight meters overhead, a form the Toulousains affectionately call le palmier, the palm tree. Beneath the altar lie the relics of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the great medieval theologian, brought here from Italy in 1368. After the Revolution the friars were expelled and Napoleon turned the church into a barracks in 1810, and only a long restoration completed in the nineteen seventies returned it to its full glory.
Fatti principali
- 1230 year — Construction of the great Dominican hall church began
- 1368 year — The relics of Saint Thomas Aquinas were brought here from Italy
- 22 ribs — Fan out from the single 'palm tree' column across the choir vault
📍 Allée Maurice Prin, 31000, Toulouse