The monastic buildings have almost entirely disappeared, the materials having doubtless served for the construction of the shabby houses which now occupy their place. Some portions of the enclosing walls, however, still survive, together with one very interesting edifice, which remains
FIG. 43. ABBEY OF CRUAS FROM S.-W.
FIG. 44. MONASTERY CHURCH, CRUAS.
tolerably entire. This is the ancient chapel of the abbey, originally a building of the twelfth century, but which in the fourteenth century was engulphed by the enclosing walls and fortifications then erected, and heightened so as to be converted into a keep ([Fig. 43]). The interior has, however, been preserved untouched, and shews the simple style of the Cistertians of the twelfth century ([Fig. 44]). The plan consists of a single nave with plain pilasters set against the side walls, from which spring the flat transverse arches which strengthen the round tunnel vault. The east end is terminated with a semi-circular apse roofed with a spherical dome, and ornamented with the small arcaded pattern so common at that period. On the left or northern side wall arches are introduced, as if for a side aisle, but there is no appearance of any aisles ever having existed. The plain round arched west doorway still exists, and the line of the original gable above it is distinctly observable in the masonry (see [Fig. 43]).
The keep built round and over the church is of remarkable design. Large round buttresses have been added at the outer angles, with square buttresses at the sides, and both are carried up so as to receive the arches which support the parapet on the top. These arches spring from bold corbels projecting from the buttresses, and are set well forward from the face of the walls, so as to leave a space between the main wall and the parapet. This space forms a long opening or machicolation, by means of which the base of the walls could be defended against hostile operations. We shall see by and by that this is the same form of machicolation as was adopted in the Pope’s Palace at Avignon, and elsewhere in the South.