The funeral cloister in the heart of Perpignan.

The funeral buildings of Saint Jean-Baptiste de Perpignan was built as early as the 14th century.  The funeral cloister Saint Jean is the largest and oldest example of a preserved funeral cloister in France.
This building was constructed under the initiative of Abbot Guillaume Jorda between 1300 and 1330.  The current building is comprised of four galleries, each around 54 metres long and they house on three sides a series of  recesses (funeral niche with a flat back) sculpted in Baixas marble limestone.  The four galleries of the cloister were primitively covered by a wooden lean-to held up by columns with sculpted capitals.  Each recess, with pure gothic lines, is marked with crests of armour belonging to rich families of Catalan nobility or bourgeoisie.  A central ossuary was dug out in 1321 for the inhumation of the less fortunate.
After the French Revolution, the building, in a worry state of sanitation, was abandoned and recovered by the Army to be used as a warehouse and a stables.  In 1825, a new building was constructed in the enclosure of the old cemetery for the intentions of a large diocesan seminar.  This new building led to the demolition of the western gallery and the dismantling of the clerestories with the exception of those to the north.