The best walks and hikes around Saint-Sauvant

Magnificent We can also have a picnic

This cave is open during the opening hours of the paleosite which offers tours.

A must-see visit alongside this abbey on a magnificent circuit

Very pretty wash house and fountain in a small typical village very renowned for its potters from other times

The typical and aptly named "Chemin de la Fontaine" leads to a magnificent wash house, a jewel in the town centre. Its stone dome shelters the spring which swells the “Ribonneau” and “Fontenelles” streams; these form the “Brameri” which, a few kilometers further south, becomes “the Bourru”. In the 16th century, it would have carried this inscription in Latin: “I nymph of this place, guardian of this fountain, I sleep to the soft murmur of this water. Whoever you are who comes to tread on this resonant stone, respect my sleep. Drink or wash, but in silence”.

This small town of less than 400 inhabitants is located in a hilly and wooded area. It is part of one of the stages of the GR 360 long-distance footpath. It is worth going past the abbey and the church while crossing the town! Both were built at the beginning of the 12th century.

A particularity is located in the gallery of arcature which overhangs the portal. Indeed it has three arched windows on one side of the central window and two semicircular on the other. Note that the two bays on the right occupy the same width as the three on the left. The bell tower, like many others in the region, has a pyramidal roof. Simple columns come to partition the two windows which cover each face. Inside the church, archival documents prove that the nave with two bays was originally vaulted with warheads. Unfortunately, this vault was destroyed during religious wars. Still according to archival documents, it would seem that at the beginning of the 20th century, a narthex, where the catechumens were held, leaned on its facade. Today, it has completely disappeared. The church was classified as a historic monument in 1913. The building underwent a complete restoration in 1935. To admire just next to the church a magnificent and majestic period residence.

The walls of the nave were doubled by means of arcades and it was endowed with a new chevet and a new bell tower. With an elegant silhouette and intact in its southern part, it is openworked with four twin bays on semicircular arches on two floors. The interior has a nave with three bays. A bay separates the nave from the front choir vaulted in blocks of rubble which, very narrow, supports the bell tower. The semi-circular apse is vaulted in cul-de-four. The 19th century side chapel, dedicated to Saint Anthony, is located on the left as you enter. Vaulted in a broken cradle, it has a stucco altar whose base has five broken arch bays. A very beautiful ornate wooden balcony dating from the end of the 19th century is located at the interior entrance of the church. The statue of Notre-Dame de Fontdouce, known as "the Virgin and Child" was sculpted by a monk from the Abbey of Fontdouce around the 15th century. It has been kept in the church of Saint Bris des Bois since the revolution and was once a destination of pilgrimage. On the back wall, a semicircular stained glass window indicates the names of the parish priest, Mr. Hague, and the mayor at the time, Mr. Lévécot (1904). The Priory of St Robert: the chapel destroyed during the wars of religion, the campanile is still in place. Saint Robert once had a great reputation, at the end of the 19th century, children suffering from certain illnesses were still brought there "before sunrise". The church was listed as a Historic Monument in 1973. To visit it you will have to pay your tribute just the price of a slight effort ....... the church is located at the top of the hill overlooking the village and adjoining the cemetery.