We pass many another relic of departed grandeur, and beyond the Place
Neuve on our right come upon a great portal which opens on a vaulted
passage leading to one of the most bewildering and extraordinary congeries
of ruined monastic buildings in France, now inhabited by a population of
poor folk--two hundred families, it is said--who, since the Revolution,
have settled in the vast buildings of the once famous and opulent
Charterhouse of Villeneuve. Founded by Innocent VI., three years after his
elevation to the papal chair, and enriched by subsequent endownments, the
Charterhouse of the Val de Benediction, the second in importance of the
Order, grew in wealth and importance during the centuries until it was
sacked and sold in small lots during the Revolution to the ancestors of
the present occupants.
The circuit of its walls was a mile in extent; its artistic treasures were
prodigious. The Coronation of the Virgin came thence; the Pieta of
Villeneuve, now in the Louvre; the founder's tomb; the high altar of Notre
Dame at Villeneuve, and a few other relics, alone survive of its vast
possessions.
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