In search of the kings and queens of France, we discover history and mysteries at the Basilique Cathédrale de Saint-Denis, on the edge of Paris.

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Hiding in plain sight at the northern end of Paris metro line 13, the Basilique Cathédrale de Saint-Denis is a jewel to rival any monument in Paris in both beauty and importance. As fans of Gothic architecture and cathedrals in general know, this was among the first and most beautiful Gothic churches built in France, and for a century the model to which all others aspired. Coming upon the basilica nowadays it’s hard to imagine its extraordinary influence and prestige through the ages.

The medieval village of Saint-Denis is all but erased by concrete buildings of the mid-to-late 20th century (among them a notable structure by Brazilian modernist Oscar Niemeyer). Standing on the wide parvis facing the basilica, flanked by the town of Saint-Denis city hall and a stately medieval abbey, its remarkable beauty despite a missing spire, felled by a lightning strike in the 19th century is a wonder to behold. Step inside for the full Gothic splendour: graceful skyward-thrusting pillars and airy vaulting interspersed with arched raised galleries, all meant to draw the eye upward to the splendid stained-glass windows that bestow the structure’s absolute majesty.

The glittering jewel-like windows date back to the 12th century (though most are now replicas as the originals are too delicate to display) and include two massive rose windows on the transept’s south and north sides. “Notre-Dame copied these rose windows,” says Serge Santos, administrator of the basilica, who possesses an encyclopaedic knowledge of the edifice, its history and the town of Saint-Denis. When he first began working here many years ago, Santos was most struck by the ethereal quality of the light. “It is a celestial Jerusalem; they have managed to do things in the cathedral symbolically.” The divine light was central to the Gothic project to recreate heaven on earth. Indeed, walking through the basilica with Santos on a fine September day, the play of rainbow light glimmers across its other most famous feature, 70 sculpted tombs, considered Europe’s most important collection of funerary sculptures dating from the 12th to the 19th centuries. It’s a paradox, this melding of light and dark, and a major part of the basilica’s intrigue, since its historic purpose was to serve as the eternal home of France’s deceased royals.

Though referred to as “the necropolis of the French kings”, the basilica’s first royal inhabitant was, in fact, a French queen. Dowager Queen Arégonde, daughter-in-law of King Clovis and great-grandmother of Dagobert 1st, was interred here in around 580 (her remains and ornate jewellery were discovered in the church crypt in 1959), followed by King Dagobert himself in 639. Both chose this for proximity to the consecrated remains of the first Bishop of Paris, Saint Denis himself, whose hallowed stature was believed to give the royals a better shot at entering paradise.

Not a lot is known about Denis, as the earliest account of the cleric’s life was written 200 years after his death. Scholars agree he was probably born in the early 200s and sent from Italy by Pope Fabian to convert the Gauls to Christianity sometime in the 3rd century. Once in Paris, which was then called Lutetia, he was appointed bishop. Denis was so popular, and so skilled at converting the heathens, that disgruntled pagan priests imprisoned and finally beheaded him along with two of his clerics on the highest hill in Paris, which may have been renamed ‘mount of the martyr’ – today’s Montmartre – in commemoration of the event.

Saintly deeds

But that didn’t stop Denis, who picked up his own head and walked for several miles, preaching a sermon along the way, before finally dropping dead. The veneration of Denis came swiftly with a shrine, followed by a chapel in his honour ordered by Saint Genevieve, the second patron saint of Paris (there are three).

A Romanesque church followed and steadily grew to accommodate the throngs of pilgrims who came to revere the saint and adore the many holy relics harboured there. The danger and destruction posed by the crowds was one reason Abbot Suger, a powerful cleric and adviser to kings Louis VI and Louis VII, decided to erect a larger church to outshine all other churches sometime around 1135. From 1140 to 1144, Suger and his masons transformed the existing Romanesque basilica using innovative new techniques that permitted the graceful but sturdy vaulting and delicate tracery windows, doing away almost entirely with interior walls in favour of stained-glass windows and instead using weight-bearing buttresses outside to allow for a soaring, elongated structure. It was all in the service of the Gothic project to elevate human consciousness from an earthly to a heavenly realm in an edifice flooded with divine light. This is the Basilica of Saint-Denis we know today. In 1966 the town of Saint-Denis became a department and a diocese and the church received the status of cathedral, hence its full name, Basilique Cathédrale de Saint-Denis.

From the basilica’s inception to its last interment, of Louis XVIII in 1824, the basilica has welcomed 43 kings, 32 queens, 60 princes and princesses and a dozen more royal personages. In fact, all but five French kings are interred here, represented by 70 splendid recumbent figures, including those of Louis XIV, Catherine de’ Medici and Henri II, and Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI. Even Napoléon hoped to be buried here, but despite his founding a school for the children of members of the Légion d’Honneur in the medieval abbey next door (which is still functioning today), he was finally denied entry, settling in at Invalides instead.

The recumbent tombs we see today are mostly empty, desecrated during the Revolution ostensibly to recover lead from the coffins to be melted down for bullets. As one of France’s two cathedrals most closely associated with French royalty – the other is Reims Cathedral, site of the royal coronations – Saint-Denis was a revolutionary target. In 1793, by decree of the National Convention, the tombs were uniformly opened and the remains dumped into a common grave. In 1817, during the Bourbon restoration, Louis XVIII ordered the common grave to be located and the bones exhumed and reburied in an ossuary in the basilica’s crypt, not far from where Saint Denis, Arégonde and Dagobert lay. Today, the ossuary is marked by a plaque bearing the names of every royal inhabitant.

Macabre remains

Some may find the necropolis macabre, but for the most part, the reposing figures are quite serene. Except, perhaps, for Henri II, whose head is thrown back in agony, having died 10 days after a jousting lance entered his eye and pierced his brain; and Louis XII, realistically depicted as a cadaver well into the stages of decay. The few remaining reliquaries may strike some as even more grotesque than any tomb, including the shrivelled heart of a young Valois king.

To see what remains of the former treasury’s priceless objects, which once included everything from Charlemagne’s jewels to a fragment of the true cross, head to the Louvre or the Museum of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. At the basilica’s eastern end, you can still behold a replica of Suger’s famous eagle in front of a stained-glass window that bears his likeness in the form of a kneeling monk. Today, Serge Santos is proud to point out the basilica’s role in the life of this multicultural city. The church hosts regular events and art exhibitions; and in a nearby courtyard, a monument to the victims of colonial slavery was inaugurated last winter, a small but damning rebuke to the kings buried here, who initiated and advanced the slave trade in France. The church is undergoing a major restoration to reassemble the Gothic 300ft north spire and add state-of-the-art signage in three languages, to be finished in the spring of 2025.

BASILICA SAINT-DENIS ESSENTIALS

Opening times

Open Mon-Sat 10am-6pm. Sun 12pm-6.15pm (religious services held daily). Admission €11. Audioguides in English.

www.saint-denis-basilique, fr/en

Tourist info

Seine-Saint-Denis Tourism

Getting there

by rail from Paris

Metro line 13, Basilique Cathédrale de Saint-Denis station. The basilica is a two- minute walk from the metro: exit to your left toward the Mairie de Saint-Denis. RER D Saint-Denis stop, then Tramway TI (5 minutes) or it’s 15 minutes on foot

by car

The basilica is 5.5 miles by car from central Paris, access via Porte de la Chapelle, then take the Al to Exit Saint-Denis Centre Ville.

From France Today Magazine