Jesuit Mission of Jesús de Tavarangüé
Unfinished Guaraní-Jesuit mission church of 1760s, a World Heritage site north of Encarnación.
The reduction was founded in 1685 by the Jesuit priest Jerónimo Delfín and moved several times before settling on its present hillside in 1758. Work then began on a very large church designed by the Catalan Jesuit brother Antonio Forcada, whose plan followed models from Loyola and other European churches. The expulsion of the Society of Jesus from Spanish America in 1767 stopped construction, and the building was left roofless, which is why its walls and openings survive in unusually complete form.
The nave measures about seventy metres by twenty-four and is entered through three portals with trilobed Moorish arches, a form rare in South America. Around the church stand the remains of the sacristy, the college, workshops and the long rows of dwellings that housed the Guaraní community, set out around a broad grass plaza. The site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1993 together with Trinidad del Paraná, and a single ticket covers the Itapúa missions for seventy-two hours.
Highlights
- Roofless mission church left unfinished at the expulsion of 1767
- Three portals with trilobed arches of Moorish derivation
- Remains of the college, workshops and Guaraní dwellings
- Evening video mapping projection on the church walls
![Afrique occidentale française : Cathédrale à St Louis / [photogr. Eugène] Gallois ; [photogr. reprod. par Radiguet et Massiot pour la conférence donnée par] Gallois](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0a/Afrique_occidentale_fran%C3%A7aise_-_Cath%C3%A9drale_%C3%A0_St_Louis_-_%28photogr._Eug%C3%A8ne%29_Gallois_%3B_%28photogr._reprod._par_Radiguet_et_Massiot_pour_la_conf%C3%A9rence_donn%C3%A9e_par%29_Gallois_-_btv1b532798828.jpg/500px-thumbnail.jpg)
![[Golestan, Le Salon et Fete de l'equinode, Teheran, Iran (le Pavillion du Trone)]](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/33/-Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg/500px--Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg)
![Théâtre de la guerre dans l'Inde sur la coste de Coromandel / par M.B.C.T. [Monsieur Bourcet Capitaine ?] ; gravé par Croisey](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/99/Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg/500px-Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg)
