Home > Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro
:For an article about the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace, go to Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace.
The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro, also known as Basilique de Notre Dame de la Paix de Yamoussoukro, is the largest and tallest place of worship in Africa. Situated in Yamoussoukro, the administrative capital of Côte d'Ivoire, the basilica was constructed between 1985 and 1989 for a cost of USD $300 million and intentionally modeled after the Basilica of Saint Peter in Rome. The cornerstone was laid on August 10, 1985 and was consecrated on September 10, 1990 by Pope John Paul II.
Contrary to popular belief, this particular basilica is not a cathedral church. The nearby Cathedral of Saint Augustin is the principal place of worship and seat of the bishop of the Diocese of Yamoussoukro.
The Guinness Book of RecordsThe Guinness Book of Records (or in recent editions Guinness World Records and in previous US editions Guinness Book of World Records is a book published annually, containing an internationally recognized collection of superlatives: both in terms of human lists it as the largest church in the world, having surpassed the previous recordholder, St. Peter's Basilica, upon completion. It has a total surface of 30,000 m².
1 Architecture
The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro was built as a memorial to Côte d'Ivoire President Félix Houphouët-BoignyFelix Houphouet-Boigny ( October 18, 1905 December 7, 1993) was the first President of Cote d'Ivoire ( 1960 1993). He rose to prominence during the colonial period, when he founded the multinational party Rassemblement Democratique Africain, which advocat, the principal planner of the project.
While designed after the principal church of CatholicismThis article considers Catholicism in the broadest ecclesiastical sense. See Catholicism (disambiguation) for alternative meanings Catholicism has two main ecclesiastical meanings, described in Webster's Dictionary as: a) "the whole orthodox Christian chu, architectAn architect is a person licensed in the art of planning, designing and overseeing the construction of buildings, or more generally, the designer of a scheme or plan. See architecture or landscape architecture Architects and landscape architects are consi Pierre Fakhoury constructed the dome to be slightly lower than the Basilica of Saint Peter but is ornamented with a larger cross on top. The finished height is 158 meters (518 feet). The basilica is constructed with marbleThis page is about the metamorphic rock. For the game with little glass spheres see marbles. Marble is metamorphosed limestone, composed of fairly pure calcite (a crystalline form of calcium carbonate, Ca C O). It is extensively used for sculpture, as an imported from ItalyThe Italian Republic or Italy ( Italian: Italia is a country in the south of Europe, consisting mainly of a boot-shaped peninsula together with two large islands in the Mediterranean Sea: Sicily and Sardinia. To the north, where it borders France, Switzer and is furnished with 7000 square meters of contemporary stained glassStrictly speaking, stained glass is glass that has been painted with silver stain and then fired. Depending on its thickness, this stains clear glass with a gold/yellow/brown color. This appears most typically in the golden haloes depicted in church windo from France. Columns are plentiful throughout the basilica but are not uniform in style. There is enough space to seat 7,000 people in the nave with standing room for an additional 11,000 people. Apart from the basilica are two identical buildings each serving as rectory and private papal villa, respectively. The villa is reserved for papal visits which has only occurred once.
The basilica was met with great controversy globally when construction began. The lavishly built basilica sits in the middle of the African bush in an impoverished city where only a minority of homes had running water and adequate sanitation. The country also had a scant Roman Catholic population of a mere thirty percent. The cost of the basilica doubled the national debt of Côte d'Ivoire.
