Collégiale Sainte-Begge, son trésor et son musée

The Collegiate church and the Romanesque churches

The Collegiate church (Andenne)

Saint Begga, great-great-grandmother of Charlemagne, when she became a widow, founded a Merovingian abbey in Andenne, circa 692. That abbey comprised seven churches, in addition to two separate quarters. In the 11th century, the monastery was changed into a secular chapter. Secular power required recruitment among the nobility.

That is why the early monastery became a predominantly female Noble Chapter.

In 1762, the seven churches were in a very poor state. The Chapter obtained permission from the Empress Maria-Theresa of Austria to replace them with a single sanctuary. It entrusted L-B Dewez, the official architect of the governor Charles de Lorraine, with drawing up the plans for a new neoclassical collegiate church. The objects discovered in the latter church included the grave of a 12th century saint, a lectern taking the form of a griffin (dinanderie brass from 1510), the stalls from 17th century, the confessionals and pulpit from the C18th, paintings from 17th century and 18th century, including the Massacre of the Innocents (1615) by Finsonius of Bruges. In the Collection and Museum located in the 12 adjoining rooms, objects are exhibited such as textiles, sculptures, manuscripts, prints, funerary monuments from the 16th century to the 20th century, including the Renaissance reliquary of Saint Begga together with religious chinaware from Andenne.

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