Tour of the Holy Bodies
The
visit of the ambulatory has makes it possible to encircle what was the first
Romance sculpture of saint-Sernin.
In the base of the roundabout seven marble reliefs were embedded.
The three first form a homogeneous group by their dimensions and their style.
In
the center, the Christ
in majesty, in a mandorle, surrounded of the symbols of the four avangelists,
is imposing in spite of the weak relief.
To
his sides, a
chérub and a
séraph carry a streamer which proclaims triple sanctus.
The four others plates represent two apostles
and two angels,
each one placed under an arcade.
The clear stylistic reference to Bernard Gilduin makes it possible to think
that the first group is contemporary altar stone, the apostles and the angels
being posterior not very, around 1100.
The ambulatory is especially impressive, today,
by an important whole of retables 
,
cupboards and of carved, painted and
gilded wood reliquaires, laid out with the XVII° S. in each vault and
between them. It is indicated evocative name of " turn of the holy bodies
" for it presented to the veneration fidéles a share of trés
the many relics which the church was enorgueillissait to have.
The ambulatory is limited, towards the interior, by a 2,50 m height wall,
at regular bored bays of which several were stopped or modified and on which
support the columns of the roundabout take.
While penetrating in the ambulatory by north, one notices in the order on the left: the cupboard of the mounting of saint Asciscle et sainte Victoire, the vault of Immaculée-Conception, the cupboard of the monting of saint Gilbert, the vault of saint Georges,the cupboard of the mounting of saint Hilaire, the vault of Saint-Esprit, the cupboard of the mounting of saint Papoul, tha vaukt of saint Martial, saint Cyr et sainte Julitte, the cupboard containing the bust of saint Jacques le Majeur, the vault sainte Sylve, the cupboard of the relics of saint Pierre et saint Paul.
The
upper crypt
In 1258, religious mentalities
having evolved, the canons hight with the sight of the fidéles the
sarcophagus of the saint. With this intention they contruisirent a large stone
baldachin on two floors which protected the large mounting out of wooden covered
with silver foil that one set up into 1283. This baldachin had required solids
foundations; one transformed the interior of the half-sunken crypt, making
disappear any trace of
romance installation.
Thus the central part of the higher crypt took its hexagonal form and was
arched warheads .
With the key a Crowning of the Virgin is carved.
In this higher room, opposite
the mounting of
saint Honoré ( XVI° s. ) a window protect
the reliquary
enamelled
of True Cross in the shape of sarcophagus produced around 1200 in Limoges.
Between
the openings of the room we can notice painted wood busts and coppers.
Bottom
crypt
One have access to bottom crypt
by two staircases.
The four ribbed vaults 
of this room of the XIV° S. take support, in the center, on an ancient,
in the beginning square and grooved marble pillar, whose angles were pulled
at the time Gothic. This space being still insufficient, one prolonged it
by also vaulted spans of warheads under the ambulatory, then, later and more
summarily, beyond.
In the lower crypt, one can
notice, in addition to many reliquarys and invaluable objects, six statues
of apostles out of wooden painted of the XIV° S. 
Four niches were arranged out of windows mural to allow the presentation of
parts of goldsmithery acquired by the parish after the Revolution.
The lower crypt presents in the six vaults the mountings of saints Philippe
et Jacques le Mineur, Simon
et Jude, Symphorien
et Castor, Jacques
le Majeur,
Edmond, Gilles,
and both reliquairys of Holy Spine.
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