A Historical Note on 3 place Cremieux  Tarascon, France

The Convent of the Ursulines and its Chapel of St Nicolas

In 1094, Etienne, Countess de Provence donated property at the edge of Tarascon to the monks of Saint Victoire in Marseille.  Countess Etienne was the mother of Bertrand II, Archbishop of Arles Aicard who moved to Tarascon in 1061 as a result of quarrels in Arles.  The property was a field outside the walls of Tarascon of that day where a church was to be built “to honor God and his crucified Son”.

Pope Urban II blessed the foundations and site of the church on his return from the Council of Clermont. Perhaps in recognition, the Chapel received from the Countess an exemption for the Abby of Saint Victor from Rhone River taxation.  Subsequently, the Chapel was consecrated in the name of Saint Nicolas, patron saint of mariners on the Rhone River.  Urban II is said to have preached the 1st Crusade on the occasion of his visit to Tarascon in 1095 after calling Christians to arms in the Council of Clermont on Nov 27, 1095 with the words “God wills it!”  The first crusade would arrive at the gates of Constantinople in the summer of 1096.

In the thirteenth century, a building was added to the church and the name of Saint Nicolas was given to the nearby hospital.  (Incorporated in actual 3 place Cremieux?)  For the next 200 years, the Chapel was in the hands of the Templars who lost control when the Order was destroyed in the early 1300s.  The order was extinguished when the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, Jacques de Molay was burned at the stake on the Ile de la Cité in Paris on 18 March 1314. Later in the 14th century, the monks of Saint Victoire sold Saint Nicolas to the Benedictines of Saint Honorat and in 1627 the Abbesse of Saint Honorat donated the Church and its buildings to the Ursulines.

In 1632, Anne of Austria, mother of Marie Therese became the benefactress of the convent and built the long north/south wing on the south side of the convent.  Anne of Austria had come to pray to Sainte Marthe to have a son which she did in 1638.  The Ursulines were charged with the education and instruction of young women.  In 1671, the final wing was added to the convent running east/west along the current place Pie.  Later, contruction would add two levels above the chapel and galleries on both sides of the chapel to link the north/south wings of the convent.

On June 7, 1790, the year after the French Revolution, the General Council of the commune of Tarascon offered the belongings of the church in Tarascon to the “representatives of the nation”.   The property  was divided up among 15 individuals who sectioned off their portions with stones 15 centimeters thick and who opened a passage through the first travée (bay) of the church to provide cart access from rue Monge to the gardens of the convent.