MARTRES-TOLOSANE Haute-Garonne, France.
1. At Chiragan on the left bank of the Garonne, 19th c. excavations brought to light a large and sumptuous Gallo-Roman villa, which contained an exceptional series of imperial busts and genre sculptures, for the most part inspired by Classical Greek or Hellenistic art. These sculptures are now kept in the Musée Saint-Raymond at Toulouse. The most likely hypothesis is that they constituted a private collection assembled in the 3d c. by a rich connoisseur.2. In the center of the village of Martres, there existed in the 4th c. another Roman villa, which was ruined around the end of the century or a little later. In its place was built the original Church of Sancta Maria de Martyribus, around which grew an Early Christian necropolis. This has produced several adorned sarcophagi of the School of Aquitaine.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. L. Joulin, Les établissements gallo-romains de la plaine de Martres-Tolosanes. Mém. presentés par divers savants à l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 1st ser., XI.2 (1901)IP (a fundamental work, but dated in regard to sculptures and esp. the imperial busts, the study of which has been revived by F. Braemer); G. Astre, “Sur l'origine des sculptures gallo-romaines de la villa de Chiragan, à Martres-Tolosane,” Annales du Midi 45 (1933) 307-9; A. Grenier, Manuel . . . II.2 (1934) 832-37, 850-58, & figs. 304-5, 313-16; for some recent discoveries, see M. Labrousse in Gallia 17 (1959) 422.2. J. Boube, “La nécropole paléo-chrétienne de Martres-Tolosane (Haute-Garonne),” Pallas 3 (1955) 89-115; id., Cahiers archéologiques 9 (1957) 33-72; for report on recent discoveries, see M. Labrousse in Gallia 26 (1968) 526-27.
M. LABROUSSE