The Abbey Church of Saint-Savin-sur-Gartempe belongs on this map because its value is concentrated in an exceptional ensemble of 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque murals. UNESCO classifies it as cultural under criteria (i)(iii), recognising both the artistic achievement and the evidence it provides for the importance of images in a monastic building. The church is in Nouvelle-Aquitaine and was inscribed in 1983.

Its distinction is not simply that it is an old abbey or a painted church. The decoration forms an immense, thematically organised biblical narrative distributed through the building. The Apocalypse appears in the clocher-porche and doorway tympanum; biblical subjects continue across the barrel vault of the nave; the Passion and martyr scenes occupy the upper porch tribune; and figures of saints appear in the choir and transept piers.

The crypt adds another layer, with the story of Saints Savin and Cyprian on its walls. Together, the murals cover 420 square metres from a single campaign, while the Gothic spire, almost 80 metres high, gives the building a later vertical marker. Notice also the difference between authenticity and untouched fabric: parts of the decoration were restored, some colours changed or disappeared, and the monastery buildings were rebuilt in the 17th century.