Tag Archives: Rouen cemetery

Cemetery of the Week #27: the Old Market Square in Rouen

Posted on August 10, 2011 | 2 comments

The garden where Jehanne’s pyre stood

Place du Vieux Marché
Rouen, France 76000
Telephone: 00 33 (0)2 32 08 32 40
Date of Joan’s martyrdom: May 30, 1431
Number of interments: 0
Open: The market square is free to visitors. The church is open April through October on Monday to Thursday and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to noon and 2 to 6 p.m. On Fridays and Sundays, the church is only open from 2 to 6 p.m. In November to March, it closes at 5:30 p.m.

Whether Jehanne d’Arc actually commanded the armies of France against the British in the 15th century or merely served as a figurehead who rallied the French to victory, it’s undisputed that she was betrayed when the walled city of Compiegne shut their portcullis, leaving her to face the army of John of Luxembourg.  Six months later, she was ransomed to Pierre Cauchon, the Bishop of Beauvais, who took her to Rouen where he presided over her trial for heresy.

Jehanne was 19 when she was tried by French clergymen in the pay of the English.  She had been wounded at least three times in battle and once while attempting escape from prison.  She could not read and could barely write her name, but she outwitted the judges ranges against her.

After her captors threatened her with torture, she repudiated the voices which had predicted her victories and ultimate downfall.  It seemed they might not find a transgression worthy of death, so her guards stole her dresses, forcing her to wear men’s clothing once more.  The court quickly found her guilty of heresy (for cross-dressing) and sentenced her to death.

Jehanne was burned at a stake in Rouen’s Market Square.  When the fire seemed to be dying, the executioner added more wood and poured oil over it, burning her bones until nothing but ashes remained.  Those were gathered up and flung into the Seine so there would be no relic, no grave that could serve to rally the French against the English.

In the end, no relic was needed.  In 1453, the English were finally driven out of France.  Charles VII took possession of the records of Jehanne’s trial and opened the way for her pardon.

Not much remains in Rouen from May 1431.  Much did not survive the centuries; more was destroyed by fire during World War II.  A cross stands in the old market square near a little garden, which marks the place where Jehanne was martyred.  A church in her name was completed nearby in 1979.

It doesn’t matter that Joan of Arc has no grave.  A steady stream of pilgrims and tourists visits the place where the girl was burned to death.  They are as reverent as if they visited a cemetery.

Links of note:

Catholic Encyclopedia listing on Joan of Arc

Tour of the Old Market Square

The Church of St. Joan of Arc

The opening of The Passion of St. Joan of Arc, which has a script from the transcript of Joan’s trial, with a soundtrack by Anonymous 4:

Other Rouen gravesites on Cemetery Travel:

Richard the Lion-Hearted

Cemetery of the Week #23: Aître Saint Maclou

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Cemetery of the Week #23: Aître Saint Maclou

Posted on July 13, 2011 | 7 comments

The Aître Saint Maclou

The Atrium of Saint Maclou
186 Rue Martainville, 76000 Rouen, France
Telephone: 02 32 08 13 90
Established: 1348
Number of interments: none any longer
Open:  Daily. April – October from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Between November and March, 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Admission: Free.

Aître Saint Maclou is tricky to find, in that the sign is up overhead. You walk through a passage between buildings to reach the atrium.

The sign is over your head.

Rouen, on the River Seine, is the historical capital city of Normandy in northwestern France. Once one of the biggest, wealthiest cities of medieval Europe, Rouen served as a capital of the Anglo-Norman dynasties, which ruled both England and large parts of France from the 11th to the 15th centuries.

When the Black Plague struck Rouen in 1348, it wiped out three-quarters of the city’s inhabitants. To accommodate the dead, a new cemetery was built near the Church of Saint Maclou. Without regard to social standings, all bodies were dumped into the mass grave.

For centuries, Christian philosophy taught that the soul was fundamental and the body mere dross, to be discarded. Simultaneously, the Church preached bodily resurrection. When the trumpet sounded on the final day, all the dead around the world would rise out of their graves to be judged. Bodiless spirits would not rise. Therefore, bones could not be cremated or otherwise destroyed. They had to be buried, preferably in hallowed ground. They could not later be discarded.

Once Rouen recovered from the Black Death, shops and homes surrounded the little cemetery. Many of these half-timbered medieval buildings still survive in the area.

The Plague returned in the 16th century. All the bones remaining in the Atrium of Saint Maclou were exhumed and placed into a cloister surrounding the cemetery, so that the ground could be reused to bury the new dead. This time, two-thirds of the surrounding parish succumbed to the Black Death.

Spades, mattocks, and coffins decorate the buildings. The weathered figures below perform the Dance of Death.

The cloisters, begun in 1526, were decorated with skulls and grave-digging implements, including spades, mattocks, and coffins. A fourth building was added to the cloister in 1651 to be a charity school for boys, even though the cemetery was still in use. These buildings were taken over by the regional Fine Arts school in the 1940s.

The cemetery itself was closed by royal decree in 1781. The area became a designated historical monument in 1862. Today the lovely, macabre courtyard remains as the only medieval ossuary still in existence in a European city center. Tour groups in every possible language often disrupt the atrium’s peace, but despite that, it is a breathtaking, thought-provoking little space.  Every city in Europe once had a space like this — and this is the only one left.

Useful Links:

French wikipedia page

Satellite photo

Travelers’ reviews

Other Rouen gravesites on Cemetery Travel:

Richard the Lion-Hearted

Joan of Arc

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Old Fashioned

Posted on July 11, 2011 | 6 comments

The grave of Richard the Lionheart’s heart

Although he was king of England, Crusader Richard the Lionheart spent very little time in England — and did not, in fact, speak English.  He grew up at his mother’s court in Aquitane, in Southern France.  All in all, Richard spent only six months of his 10-year reign in England.

In 1199, he was shot by a crossbow bolt while besieging the castle of Chalus-Chabrol.  The wound became toxic and he died, leaving his kingdom to his brother John (who later signed the Magna Carta).

Richard wanted his entrails buried at Chalus and his body buried at the foot of his father’s tomb in Fontevraud Abbey in Anjou.  His heart he bequeathed to the city of Rouen, which had always remained faithful to him.

After the Funeral:  Posthumous Adventures of Famous Corpses reports that “His exceptionally large heart was encased in a silver casket.”  That casket was donated to ransom St. Louis from the Saracens in 1250.  The heart it had contained disappeared for centuries, then turned up in 1838 in a lead box marked, “Hic jacet cor Ricardi Regis Anglorum.”

If all that is true, I’m not sure what actually lies in the tomb in Rouen’s Cathedral de Notre-Dame.  Its inscription reads, “Hic cor conditum est Ricardi Anglorum Regis qui Cor Leonis dictus.”  Roughly, that’s “Here lies the heart of the English king Richard, called Lionheart.”

The tomb looks like a medieval grave, complete with the clean-shaven monarch resting his crowned head on a stone pillow, broken sword lying on his breast, and his feet against a crouching lion.  I believe that signifies he died in battle.  It’s a wonderful old-fashioned monument, whatever lies within.

The effigy where his body lies at Fontevraud shows him as bearded.  You can see the photo comparison here.

My review of After the Funeral is here.

Other Rouen gravesites on Cemetery Travel:

Cemetery of the Week #23: Aître Saint Maclou

Joan of Arc

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