Vendeuvre (Canton of Morteaux-Couliboeuf, Calvados) Church of Saint-Brice-de-Grisy

    The church at Grisy dates back, for the most part, to the thirteenth century. The walls of the chancel and the nave are pierced with lancet arches. The northern side tower, square in shape, is contemporary in its lower part to the rest of the building. Modifications in the fifteenth century slightly altered the appearance of the church, the bell tower was raised another level, with twin windows. A roofed porch, which no longer exists, was constructed to protect the main door on the eastern façade. A rounded archway was also added to the northern wall of the nave, with an inscription in gothic characters indicating two dates "1464" and "1484". The crenellated parapet was added to the tower during the religious wars.
The main door on the eastern façade is the only Roman vestige of the church. It may have belonged to an earlier building, being incorporated into the church during its construction. The remainder of the façade dates from later, the walls are from the thirteenth century, and the double-projection salient buttresses are Gothic. The walled gable of the façade, dressed with limestone stonework, is covered with ivy. Only the doorway and the buttresses are free of vegetation. The rounded arch of the great door rests on the original two plinths of a mono-cylindrical column adjoining at the base and the capital. The plinth of the right-hand column has disappeared. The capitals, which have doubtless been restored, are sculpted with layers of leaves. The arch comprises two archivolts. The interior archivolt, which is slightly bevelled, rests on two jambs which are also sparsely decorated. The external archivolt is sculpted with chevrons, which overlap from the torus onto the intrados. There is a double band ornamented with crosses and festoons following the extrados of the arch.
This doorway is characterised by its great simplicity and its décor, using motifs common during the Roman era.

Bibliography

- Galeron, Statistiques de l'arrondissement de Falaise, Brée, Falaise, s. d.
T. III, 7^th book., pp. 510-511
- Caumont Arcisse (de), Statistique monumentale du Calvados, Hardel, Caen, 1859.T. 4, pp. 640 to 643
- Alix, Recherches sur Grisy, Société d'impression de Basse-Normandie, Caen, 1935, pp. 26 to 29.
- Rossi Michèle, Les églises romanes de la vallée moyenne de la Dives, Caen, 1973, 6 vol. (Mém. Maîtrise Hist. Caen, 1973).
p. 91 to 95, T.III, p. 85 (ill.)