What it is
Its full name is the primatial church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste-et-Saint-Étienne: a cathedral, and more — the Archbishop of Lyon holds the title Primate of the Gauls. It stands in the middle of Vieux Lyon, the survivor of a medieval group of churches, two of which were destroyed in the Revolution.
Earlier cathedrals stood on the site; the present building is Romanesque at the east end and Gothic toward the west front, the product of several centuries of work.
What to look at
The west front faces a small square by the Saône, and its carved portals are worth time. Inside, look for the astronomical clock in the north side and the stained glass of the choir.
Getting it right
A working cathedral: services come first. The funicular station for Fourvière is right beside it.
Why the archbishop is Primate of the Gauls
Saint-Jean is both a cathedral, the seat of the Archbishop of Lyon, and a primatial church: its archbishop holds the title Primate of the Gauls, a precedence, now purely honorary, over the four ecclesiastical provinces of 1079, Lyon, Rouen, Tours and Sens. The claim rests on how early Lyon became Christian, on its many famous martyrs, and on the writings of one of its bishops, Saint Irenaeus.
Its full dedication is to Saint John the Baptist and Saint Stephen. The church itself was originally Stephen's and its baptistery John's; as often happened, the baptistery's name stuck. In the Middle Ages it was one of a group of churches, including Saint-Étienne and Sainte-Croix, both destroyed during the Revolution; the choir school building beside it, the manécanterie, survives.
Its rank was not always accepted. In the Middle Ages the merchants of the Presqu'île claimed that their church of Saint-Nizier had been the city's first cathedral. The documents they produced, all written in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, were taken at face value in the nineteenth century, but they were forgeries, part of the townspeople's effort to free themselves from the authority of the cathedral chapter. Since December 20, 2020, the Archbishop of Lyon has been Olivier de Germay.
Three centuries of building
The first cathedral recorded here, called simply the great church, was built by Bishop Patiens; the second, larger one, by Leidrade in the ninth century. The present building took shape over three centuries, from 1175 to 1480, just as Western architecture was moving from Romanesque to Gothic: Archbishop Guichard de Pontigny began a Romanesque church, Jean Belles-mains started turning it into a Gothic one, and Renaud de Forez gave it its final form. The cramped site between hill and river limited its size to an interior length of 80 meters.
Even unfinished, it was at the center of European history. It hosted the first and second Councils of Lyon in 1245 and 1274, and the coronation of Pope John XXII in 1316; between 1244 and 1251 it served as the church of Pope Innocent IV, who lived in Lyon for nearly seven years. On December 17, 1600, King Henri IV married Marie de' Medici here.
Damage and repair
In 1562, during the Wars of Religion, the Calvinist troops of the Baron des Adrets devastated the cathedral, damaging the tympanums of its three portals; in the eighteenth century, the remaining medieval carving on them was deliberately chiseled away as old-fashioned. The Revolution and the siege of Lyon in 1793 caused more harm. In the nineteenth century the architect Tony Desjardins set out to make Saint-Jean an ideal Gothic cathedral, with a raised roof and new spires; strong criticism stopped part of the plan. In September 1944, sabotage by retreating German troops shattered most of the stained glass, and restoring the windows, then the facades and interior, has occupied much of the time since.
Look closely at the west front: the portals are framed by rows of small carved medallions, eight stacked on each visible face of each pier, including scenes from the Bible. The cathedral has been a classified monument since 1862, and its quarter became France's first protected historic district on May 12, 1964.
The astronomical clock and the chapels
In the north transept stands the astronomical clock, first mentioned at the end of the fourteenth century and restored in 2021. Several times a day its chimes set nineteen automata in motion: angels, a rooster, a Swiss guard, the Annunciation, the Holy Spirit as a dove and God the Father giving a blessing.
The Bourbon chapel has stained glass by Pierre de Paix, who succeeded Jean Prévost as the cathedral's appointed glassmaker. Because the canons held so long to the distinctive Lyon rite of worship, Saint-Jean was the last French cathedral to install an organ, in 1841, which explains its modest size. It also draws visitors for the special events held there during the Fête des Lumières.
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