Gabriel Nigond, Fernand Maillaud and Émile Jacob in Verneuil-sur-Igneraie, Indre (36)

Three medallions, by Ernest Nivet in 1947, on the north face of the church in Verneuil-sur-Igneraie, Indre.

The one at the top is of Gabriel Nigond (1877-1937), a writer who published his first collection of poetry when he was seventeen. When he moved to Paris, he became friends with Marcel Schwob. In cabaret he worked with Hugues Lapaire, and his poems and monologues in patois earned him a good reputation. Séverine discovered him and introduced him to the publishing house Stock. He wrote a number of successful plays and novels, and was a friend of the painter Fernand Maillaud who illustrated some of his books.

Below Nigond's medallion, on the left, is Fernand Maillaud's. Maillaud (1862-1948) drew for various journals and was also friends with the gifted female photographer Jenny de Vasson, the novelist and critic Hugues Lapaire, and Jacques des Gachons, a writer of popular novels set in Berry.

Émile Jacob (1867-1953) was a priest in the Bourges diocese, and was a writer who also published under the pseudonym Hector de Corlay. He was a friend of both Nigond and Maillaud, and wrote a number of works on local history, pastoral life and the potters of Verneuil.