COLLEGIALE DE BÉDOUES - BEDOUES-COCURES

The Notre Dame de Bédouès collegiate church marks the entrance to the upper valley of the Tarn. Pope Urban V had it erected to house the remains of the Grimoard family in 1363. Built in schist, originally in the form of a Latin cross, it will be transformed into a real castle surrounded by high walls. During the wars of religion, in 1580, Captain Merle, Protestant leader, and his troop attack the sanctuary. No neighborhood, the canons and soldiers are massacred, the building is looted and ruined. Forty years after the passage of Merle, the sanctuary is restored. Fortifications are once again ravaged by the revolution. In 1793, the church is stripped of its ornaments. It was extremely reworked in the nineteenth century.