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Saint Nicholas Church, Brussels

Saint Nicholas Church
  • Église Saint-Nicolas (French)
  • Sint-Niklaaskerk (Dutch)
Map
50°50′52″N 4°21′06″E / 50.84778°N 4.35167°E / 50.84778; 4.35167
LocationRue au Beurre / Boterstraat
1000 City of Brussels, Brussels-Capital Region
CountryBelgium
DenominationCatholic Church
History
DedicationSaint Nicholas
Architecture
Functional statusActive
Heritage designationProtected[1]
Designated05/03/1936
Architectural typeChurch
Administration
Archdiocese Mechelen–Brussels
Clergy
ArchbishopLuc Terlinden
(Primate of Belgium)

Saint Nicholas Church (French: Église Saint-Nicolas; Dutch: Sint-Niklaaskerk) is a Catholic church in central Brussels, Belgium. Founded around 1125, it is one of the first four churches in Brussels and the best preserved in its successive developments. It is dedicated to Saint Nicholas.[2]

The church was designated a historic monument on 5 March 1936.[1] Its western (main) façade dates from the 1950s.[3]

Description

Exterior

To the west, the church has a tripartite façade, built in Massangis stone by the architect J. Rombaux in 1956, and supported by powerful buttresses with stepped slopes and saddlebacks.[3] This façade is pierced in its centre by a classicist-style portal flanked on either side by flat, rounded pilasters whose Ionic capitals support an entablature comprising a high, undecorated architrave and a projecting cornice surmounted by a bas-relief sculpted by J. Lacroix in 1956 representing a Madonna and Child (Sedes Sapientiae) surrounded by two angels.[4] The angel on the left is playing the harp and the angel on the right is handling a censer. The portal is surmounted by an immense Gothic-style glass roof and a large gilded clock, carried by the gable.[4]

The side façades are pierced with large ogival bays and are supported by stepped buttresses, without saddlebacks, unlike the western façade. These façades are hidden by small houses leaning against the church, including the "De Goude Huyve" house in Baroque style.[5] The arms of the transept do not extend beyond the plane of the side façades: only the northern arm (Rue de Tabora/Taborastraat) has a triangular gable.[4]

The crossing of the transept is surmounted by a square bell tower with louvers ending in a small bulb which bears a golden ball, a wrought iron cross and a rooster.[4]

Interior

Inside, the church's walls, pillars and ribbed vaults are coated and painted white. To the west, the back of the church is occupied by an imposing rood screen supported by uncoated blue stone columns, each ending in a Corinthian capital.[6] To the east, the choir, completely off-centre, has a central five-sided apse flanked by a single apsidiole on the left.[7]

A cannonball, from the bombardment of Brussels by the French troops in August 1695, is stuck in the top of a pillar of the nave.[8]

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^ a b Région de Bruxelles-Capitale (2016). "Eglise Saint-Nicolas" (in French). Brussels. Retrieved 12 November 2024.
  2. ^ Mardaga 1989, p. 116.
  3. ^ a b Mardaga 1989, p. 117–119.
  4. ^ a b c d Mardaga 1989, p. 119.
  5. ^ Mardaga 1989, p. 128.
  6. ^ Mardaga 1989, p. 121.
  7. ^ Mardaga 1989, p. 117.
  8. ^ "A propos d'un boulet" [About a cannonball]. Le Soir (in French). 11 January 1996. Retrieved 12 November 2024.

Bibliography
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