La Cerlangue (canton of Saint-Romain-de-Colbosc, Seine-Maritime) Church of Saint-Jean-d'Abbetot

    The old parish of Saint-Jean d'Abbetot, attached during the last century to the commune of La Cerlangue, was placed under the patronage of the Abbey of Saint-Georges de Boscherville, which doubtless explains the outstanding architectural quality of this village church. Rebuilt in the 16th and 17th centuries, the nave is of little interest. The attention must be entirely focussed on the rest of the building: the crossing, deprived of its arms, with the tower above it; the straight chancel bay, its walls set off by slender blind arcades; the deepish apse at the end of the chancel, lit through three windows opening above the squat arcades; and lastly the crypt, lording it underneath these last three sections of the church. The capital ornaments lead one to think that the church was built in the late 11th c. 
The Romanesque sections of the church and the crypt are decorated with 13th and 14th c. wall paintings which were unfortunately over-restored during the 19th century. 
On the outside, the most admirable feature is the elegant composition of the apse, divided by broad, flat buttresses spanned by semi-circular relieving arches round the windows.

Henry Decaëns

Bibliography

- Carment-Lanfry, Anne-Marie. - Les églises romanes dans les anciens archidiaconés du Grand Caux et du Petit Caux au diocèse de Rouen : doyenné de Saint-Romain de Colbosc : Saint-Jean d'Abbetot. - Revue des Sociétés savantes de Haute-Normandie : lettres et sciences humaines, n° 51, troisième trimestre 1968, p. 27-32.
- Musset Lucien, Normandie romane, t. II, p. 241-244. - Sainte-Marie de la Pierre-qui-Vire : Zodiaque, 1974