+THE FRENCH ROMANESQUE.+ Though monasticism produced remarkable results in France, architecture there did not wholly depend upon the monasteries. Southern Gaul (Provence) was full of classic remains and classic traditions while at the same time it maintained close trade relations with Venice and the East.[19] The church of +St. Front+ at Perigueux, built in 1120, reproduced the plan of St. Mark’s with singular fidelity, but without its rich decoration, and with pointed instead of round arches (Figs. 94, 95). The domical cathedral of +Cahors+ (1050-1100), an obvious imitation of S. Irene at Constantinople, and the later and more Gothic Cathedral of +Angoulême+ display a notable advance in architectural skill outside of the monasteries. Among the abbeys, +Fontevrault+ (1101-1119) closely resembles Angoulême, but surpasses it in the elegance of its choir and chapels. In these and a number of other domical churches of the same Franco-Byzantine type in Aquitania, the substitution of the Latin cross in the plan for the Greek cross used in St. Front, evinces the Gallic tendency to work out to their logical end new ideas or new applications of old ones. These striking variations on Byzantine themes might have developed into an independent local style but for the overwhelming tide of Gothic influence which later poured in from the North. [Footnote 19: See Viollet-le-Duc, _Dictionnaire raisonné_, article ARCHITECTURE, vol. i., pp. 66 _et seq._; also de Verneilh, _L’Architecture byzantine en France_.] [Illustration: FIG. 95.--INTERIOR OF ST. FRONT, PERIGUEUX.] Meanwhile, farther south (at Arles, Avignon, etc.), classic models strongly influenced the details, if not the plans, of an interesting series of churches remarkable especially for their porches rich with figure sculpture and for their elaborately carved details. The classic archivolt, the Corinthian capital, the Roman forms of enriched mouldings, are evident at a glance in the porches of Notre Dame des Doms at Avignon, of the church of St. Gilles, and of St. Trophime at Arles. [Illustration: FIG. 96.--PLAN OF NOTRE DAME DU PORT, CLERMONT.] [Illustration: FIG. 97.--SECTION OF NOTRE DAME DU PORT, CLERMONT.]