ABSTRACT
The winning bidders were businessmen from the departmental seat, Macon, a city less than fifteen miles southeast of Cluny. Demolition on the site continued until 1822, when a deal was signed between the national government and the town of Cluny to use the remaining stone from the east end of the church in order to build a national stable for the stallions of the Republican army. Twenty years after the deal to use the remains of the abbey church at Cluny for stables, in 1842, the city of Macon, county seat of the department of the Saone-et-Loire, commissioned the design of a monumental new church for its center, opposite the Hotel de Ville. Although awareness of the neo-Romanesque style was not widespread when Macon leaders began their project, Berthier's efforts in Macon were part of a larger pattern of interest in medieval styles among contemporary French architects.
