HOME INDUSTRY IN THE NORTH COAST REGION OF FRANCE 



'The roofs are a joy, simply thick rolls of straw laid close by the farmer and cemented 

 together by Nature in a few months with moss and flowers" (see text, page 395)- 



BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE IN FRANCE 



Perigueux, the principal city and capi- 

 tal of the province of Perigord, with its 

 grand and beautiful Byzantine cathedral 

 dreaming above the little river Isle, is a 

 cross-section of the Levant. The soft, 

 seductive colors of the gold and verdant 

 landscape, the alluring vistas of the 

 domed city that have somehow no small 

 suggestion of the East, the languorous 

 climate, all aid in establishing the illusion 

 that this lovely region is not in western 

 Europe at all. But why ? How did this 

 happen, and what gave the town its east- 

 ern personality? (see page 437). 



Briefly, during the tenth and eleventh 

 centuries, Perigueux was the headquar- 

 ters of Venetian merchants, whose trade 

 with the west of France and with distant 

 Britain had perforce to come overland 



from the south because of pirates at Gib- 

 raltar. One result of their traffic was 

 the noble Church of St. Front, now the 

 cathedral. It is a glorious example of 

 the Byzantine, a pure Greek cross in 

 form, crowned by five soaring domes — 

 which reveal St. Mark's as their pro- 

 genitor — and a magnificently domed and 

 colonnaded spire, or tower, just a yard 

 less than 200 feet in height — the only one 

 of its kind existing in France today. 



Apart from the cathedral, Perigueux 

 is a captivating little city, full of old 

 houses that seem never to have been new. 

 one of them half on struts over a minia- 

 ture sidewalk. Quaint dwellings on the 

 Rue du Lys, smothered with vines and 

 flowers, haven't even a strip of sidewalk ; 

 they open doors at the very gutter and 

 let out sleepy dogs and chickens. In the 

 grounds of the beautiful ruined Chateau 



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