Built and re-built from the 12th until the 19th century, it includes Romanesque, Gothic and Neo-Gothic elements, as well as Roman columns and parts of the baptistery from a 6th-century Christian church.

[1] According to the Christian tradition, the first church on the site was founded by Saint Maximinus of Aix, who arrived in Provence from Bethany, a village near Jerusalem, with Mary Magdalene on a boat belonging to Lazarus.

Maximin built a modest chapel on the site of the present cathedral and dedicated it to the Holy Saviour (le Saint Sauveur).

Around the year 500, under the bishop Basilius, a group of episcopal buildings was constructed on top of the old Roman forum, including a chapel, a baptistery and several other rooms.

The choir of this church ended in a flat chevet wall, which connected by a door with the Sainte-Chapelle, part of the original 6th century episcopal buildings.

Religious orders began to arrive; the Franciscans first, then the Dominicans, Carmelites, and Augustinians, building new churches, monasteries and convents.

Pierre Souquet created the two statues on the upper level, representing the first two bishops of Aix, traditionally named as Maximinus and Sidonius.

Above the prophets are the figures of twelve Sybils, pagan fortune-tellers from antiquity, honoured by medieval Christian scholars for having forecast the birth, death and resurrection of Christ.

The four columns at the angles of the cloister are decorated with carvings of the symbols of the four evangelists: an angel for St. Matthew; a lion for St. Mark; a bull for St. Luke; and an eagle for St. John.

A marble slab in the west gallery, whose inscription has worn away, may be the tomb of Basilius, bishop of Aix in 500, and the builder of the first cathedral.

The work was done by Revoil, the architect of the diocese, who was in contact with Viollet-le-Duc and his partners on the restoration of the Sainte Chapelle in Paris that was taking place about the same time.

This monument comprises: Aix Cathedral plays a significant role in Émile Zola's novel, La Conquete de Plassans (1874), where it is referred to as Saint-Saturnin.