The Treasury contains, in a modern reliquary, two pieces of white silk, regarded as part of the tunic or veil of the Virgin, which had been given to Charlemagne by the Empress Irene, and was afterwards presented to Chartres by Charles the Bald.
THE LESSER CHURCHES OF CHARTRES
St. Pierre or St. Père-en-Vallée. The abbey church of St. Père-en-Vallée, founded by Clovis, is a fine building dating from the twelfth to the fourteenth century. It was commenced in 1150, under the direction of the monk Hilduard, and almost entirely rebuilt in the thirteenth century. Of the earlier construction there remains the lower part of the choir, with its heavy pillars, the aisles which surround the choir, and the chapels. The great square tower has been placed as early as 940, but may have been built a century later. The stained glass belongs to the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, the earliest being in the choir excluding the apse. In the south aisle of the nave is the tombstone (1037) of Robert, Archbishop of Rouen, son of Richard I., Duke of Normandy. Unique enamels of the twelve Apostles can be seen in the apsidal chapel.
St. Aignan is mainly a Renaissance church, with the chief entrance built in the fourteenth century. The windows are the most interesting feature.
St. Martin-au-Val is the church of the ancient priory of the abbey of Marmontier, and to-day the chapel of the Hôpital St. Brice—a curious building of the twelfth century, incorporating some remains of a great basilica previous to the tenth century. The crypt contains some Roman capitals of marble, stone sarcophagi, and the tomb of a Bishop of Chartres.
St. André, an interesting ruined collegiate church, now a shop, built, about 1108, over two square crypts belonging to Early Christian times. There is a beautiful Romanesque door.
St. Foi is chiefly a Flamboyant church. It was desecrated with great profanity in the Revolution, and remained secular until it was reconsecrated in 1862.
The Hôtel de Ville is a Renaissance building, formerly the Hôtel Montescot (1614). It contains the Museum of pictures, objects of art, ancient armour and tapestry, and also the Library.
The Bishop’s Palace is a seventeenth-century building.
Maison de Loëns, built over a thirteenth-century crypt.