V St. Etienne de Fréjus
The ancient episcopal city of Fréjus has perhaps more than a due share of the attractions for the student and lover of the historic past. It is one of the most ancient cities of Provence. Its charm of environment, people, and much else that it offers, on the surface or below, are as irresistible a galaxy as one can find in a small town of scarce three thousand inhabitants. And Fréjus is right on the beaten track, too, though it is not apparent that the usual run of pleasure-loving, tennis-playing, and dancing-party species of tourist—at a small sum per head, all included—ever stop here en route to the town’s more fashionable Riviera neighbours—at least they do not en masse—as they wing their way to the more delectable pleasures of naughty Nice or precise and proper Mentone.
The establishment of a bishopric here is somewhat doubtfully given by “La Gallia Christiania” as having been in the fourth century. Coupled with this statement is the assertion that the cathedral at Fréjus is very ancient, and its foundation very obscure; but that it was probably built up from the remains of a “primitive temple consecrated to an idol.” Such, at least, is the information gleaned from a French source, which does not in any way suggest room for doubt.
Formerly the religious administration was divided amongst a provost, an archdeacon, a sacristan, and twelve canons. The diocese was suppressed in 1801 and united with that of Aix, but was reëstablished in 1823 by virtue of the Concordat of 1817. To-day the diocese divides the honour of archiepiscopal dignity with that of Toulon.
The foundations of St. Etienne are admittedly those of a pagan temple, but the bulk of the main body of the church is of the eleventh century. The tower and its spire—not wholly beautiful, nor yet in any way unbeautiful—are of the period of the ogivale primaire.
As to style, in so far as St. Etienne differs greatly from the early Gothic of convention, it is generally designated as Provençal-Romanesque. It is, however, strangely akin to what we know elsewhere as primitive Gothic, and as such it is worthy of remark, situated, as it is, here in the land where the pure round-arched style is indigenous.
The portal has a doorway ornamented with some indifferent Renaissance sculptures. To the left of this doorway is a baptistère containing a number of granite columns, which, judging from their crudeness, must be of genuine antiquity.
There is an ancient Gothic cloister, hardly embryotic, but still very rudimentary, because of the lack of piercings of the arches; possibly, though, this is the result of an afterthought, as the arched openings appear likely enough to have been filled up at some time subsequent to the first erection of this feature.
The bishop’s palace is of extraordinary magnitude and impressiveness, though of no very great splendour. In its fabric are incorporated a series of Gallo-Roman pilasters, and it has the further added embellishment of a pair of graceful twin tourelles.
The Roman remains throughout the city are numerous and splendid, and, as a former seaport, founded by Cæsar and enlarged by Augustus, the city was at a former time even more splendid than its fragments might indicate. To-day, owing to the building up of the foreshore, and the alluvial deposits washed down by the river Argens, the town is perhaps a mile from the open sea.