Two of the apostles on the tomb; identifiable by their symbols, they are Saint Peter (Keys) and Saint Paul (Sword).
The mausoleum of Louis XII and Anne de Bretagne
Louis XII, King of France from 1498 to 1515, and his second wife Anne of Brittany. Last king of the Valois dynasty.
The mausoleum of Louis XII and Anne of Brittany was carved in Carrara marble by Italian sculptors. It is evidence of the contacts that were established between artists during the Italian wars.
This small antique-style temple is surrounded by the twelve Apostles and the four Cardinal Virtues, Prudence, Might, Justice and Temperance and the plinth is decorated with bas-reliefs depicting several victorious episodes of the Italian wars.
Inside the mausoleum, the royal couple are portrayed transfixed and motionless in death. On their abdomens are depicted, for the sake of realism, the sewn-up openings made for the purposes of evisceration. On the upper level the kneeling sovereigns pray for the life to come.
[Seine-Saint-Denis tourisme]
Taken in the Basilica of Saint-Denis, Saint-Denis arrondissement, Paris
Basilique de Saint-Denis (Basilica of Saint-Denis)
Built on the tomb of Saint Denis, a missionary bishop who died around 250, a first church was probably built in the 5th century.
From the death of King Dagobert, in 639, until the 19th century, the abbey of Saint-Denis welcomed the burial of 43 kings, 32 queens and a dozen servants of the monarchy. It gradually became the most important collection in Europe of funerary sculptures made from the 12th to the 16th century. This role as a royal necropolis earned it the nickname "the cemetery of kings " by a 13th century chronicler. Today, the monument houses no less than 70 recumbents and tombs.
In the 12th century, the Saint-Denis basilica was established as a new architectural masterpiece under the impetus of Abbot Suger, advisor to Louis VI and Louis VII. It was gradually rebuilt in a new style, with innovative principles for the time, such as the ribbed vaults.
Following the Revolution, in 1792, the monks had to leave their buildings, whose reconstruction had just been completed. In October 1793, the royal bodies of the Bourbons were exhumed from the lead tombs, as France was at war and needed metal to make bullets. In 1794, the Commission of Arms and Powder ordered the removal of the roof made of lead sheets.
Disused, the ruined building was more or less exposed to the elements for many years. It was then transformed into a theater and a warehouse for flour and wheat!
However, under the impulse of Châteaubriant, at the beginning of the Empire, Napoleon I decided to restore the monument to dedicate it to the burial of the emperors and to remind the memory of the former kings...In 1817, Louis XVIII, the new Bourbon king, decided to have the mixed remains of the sovereigns searched for and reburied in an ossuary in the crypt, the former vault of Turenne.
In 1809, Napoleon signed the decree for the installation of the educational center of the Legion of Honor, which is still in place today, in the old monastic buildings...in 1813, Napoleon I commissioned the architect François Debret to restore the building. A colossal project was undertaken throughout the monument: stained glass windows, facades, floors, vaults and sculptures were restored. However, the work was contested from the 1830s onwards and gave rise to controversy, culminating in the question of the north spire. On June 9, 1837, lightning struck the 90 m high spire, Debret had it repaired, but the tornado of 1845 weakened it again, which precipitated the departure of the architect and his replacement by Viollet-le-Duc.
[www.saint-denis-basilique.fr]
