Notre-Dame de la Garde, Marseille

Notre-Dame de la Garde (literally Our Lady of the Guard), is a Catholic basilica in Marseille, France. This Neo-Byzantine church was built by the architect Henri-Jacques Espérandieu on the foundations of an ancient fort located at the highest natural point in Marseille, a 149 m (490 ft) limestone outcrop on the south side of the Old Port. It is a major local landmark and the site of a popular annual pilgrimage every year on Assumption Day, August 15. The basilica was consecrated on June 5, 1864 and replaced a church of the same name built in 1214 and restored in the 15th century. It was built on the foundations of a 16th-century fort built by Francis I of France to resist the 1536 siege of Marseilles by the Emperor Charles V. The basilica consists of a lower church, or crypt, in the Romanesque style carved from the rock, as well as an upper church of Neo-Byzantine style decorated with mosaics. A square bell tower of 41 m (135 ft) topped by a belfry of 12.5 m (42 ft) supports a monumental 11.2 m (27 ft) statue