Paris1972-Versailles2003

I have this church mix in with other post and feel should have a post of its own in my blog, One of the wonderful sights we saw while walking the pavement of nice Valencia. I have several posts on the city in my blog, you just need to search,,, Therefore, let me tell you about the Church Saint Nicolas de Bari and Saint Pedro, the Martyr of Valencia !!! Hope you enjoy the post as I.

Valencia by the Mediterranean coast is a lovely town often overlook for the bigger two others but worth a detour indeed.  I came often in my early teen years as lived in Madrid and had an aunt on mother’s side that lived in El Saler. Then , took advantage and went o Valencia with them ; always nice souvenirs of our family visits ; several years ago she passed away and now visits are less but do come ,see my posts, This is  Valencia, capital of Comunitat Valenciana in my beloved kingdome of Spain.

The parish Church of Saint Nicolás de Bari and Saint Pedro martyr is a parish church located in Calle Caballeros No. 35, in the historical center, specifically between the neighborhoods of La Seu, El Carme and El Mercat. It is one of the best examples of coexistence of a 15C Gothic Church with a spectacular 17C baroque decor. After its restoration in 2016 it is popularly known as the Valencian Sistine Chapel. It has its usual worship schedule and also a timetable for sightseeing or cultural visits. The temple is located next to the Calle Caballeros, which was the old Decumano of the Valentia Edetanorum founded by the Romans in the year 138 BC, and in the vicinity of the Plaza de San Nicolás have been found funerary remains belonging to an ancient Roman temple. Then it was briefly a temple Paleocristian- Visigoth until the arrival of the Muslims in the 8C, when in its place a mosque was erected towards the east, towards Mecca. With the conquest of Valencia by King Jaime I of Aragon in 1238 this ancient mosque was consecrated as a Christian parish and donated to the Order of preachers or Dominicans, who baptized it in honor of St. Nicholas of Bari. Years later the same order added another titular Saint to the parish, St. Pedro el Martyr, who was the first martyr of the Dominican Order.  It was in the 15C when the temple was rebuilt and expanded acquiring its current physiognomy of the Valencian Gothic with a single nave, polygonal apse and six bays, in which there are so many vaults of simple crossing and six chapels to each side located between the buttresses of the nave’s pointed arches. Another gothic element that is preserved is the outer cover at the foot of the temple, built in the second half of the 15C, with archivolts in pointed arches, with a Baroque relief added later in the tympanum and with a meat dish carved in the key alluding to a miracle of St. Nicholas of Bari. On this cover there is a large neo-góthic rosette inspired by the star of David, which was an extension of the original Gothic rosette that had in the same place but smaller dimensions.

To the right of this facade is the only Chapel outside the temple, closed with a gate and call of the Christ of the Fossar, since in this place was the old parish cemetery before its 15C Gothic enlargement.   The taste for Baroque decoration opens its way inside the Christian temples within the atmosphere of the Reformation and the idea of modernizing the Gothic. For this reason at the end of the 17C, between 1690 and 1693, the Baroque recovered the interior with engravings, stuccoes and reliefs that were rather sculptures, like the plaster putti sculpted on each pilaster. It was, also the work of the arches of half point on the chapels that hide the original gothic pointed arches. The south facade, which falls to the pedestrian Plaza de San Nicolás, is all neo-Gothic style due to the urban renovation of the Plaza de San Nicolás promoted by the city/town hall in the 19C.

Oo the left of its facade is a ceramic panel of 1957 in memory of the premonition that the Dominican Valencian San Vicente Ferrer ( and came preaching in my current area of Morbihan and is buried in the Cathedral St Peter in Vannes! ) did to a young Alfonso de Borja, predicting that someday the young man would be named Pope, as it happened years later as Pope Callixtus III (He was also responsible for the retrial of Joan of Arc  that saw her vindicated) . Visits are only accessed by the door located in Calle Caballeros, No 35, which leads to a hallway through which access to the interior of the temple as cultural or tourist visits are not allowed on Mondays or during the worship hours. They can be made from Tuesday to Friday from 10h30 to 19h30, Saturdays from 10h30 to 18h30   and Sundays from 13h to 20h. The timetables may undergo modifications for specific liturgical celebrations, so it is recommended to consult the agenda of the Church.

The official parish of San Nicolas de Bari on the church: https://www.sannicolasvalencia.com/

The Valencia tourist office on the church: https://www.visitvalencia.com/en/what-to-do-valencia/valencian-culture/monuments-in-valencia/iglesia-san-nicolas-bari-san-pedro-martir-valencia

There you go folks, a nice walking tour of Valencia and a wonderful monument of the Church Saint Nicolas de Bari and Saint Pedro ,the Martyr Again, hope you have enjoy the post as I

And remember, happy travels, good health, and many cheers to all !!!