Sophia Beale - The Churches of Paris, from Clovis to Charles X

This is curious as showing the antiquity of the fashion of plaiting surplices which is customary in France.

Dom Millet.

"Ensépouturé fut en l'église Saint-Denis en France à cui il avoit donnez maint biau don, mis fu en costé le mestre autel en un riche sarcu d'alebastre." (Chronicle of S. Denis.) And yet, soon after Charles's death, S. Eucher is supposed to have seen, by revelation, the sufferings of the Maire du Palais in Hell, where for his sins he was precipitated before the Day of Judgment. The tomb was opened in the presence of Bishop Eucher, Boniface the legate, and Fulrad, abbot of S. Denis, when behold! a great dragon jumped out, and the coffin had the appearance of having been burned.

Helgaud, Vie de Robert le Pieux .

Idem.

Robert was abbot of S. Denis.

Suger, Vie de Louis-le-Gros .

Adèle ou Alix, daughter of Thibaut le Grand, comte de Champagne, third wife of Louis VII.

Near Melun.

Mézeray.

Vie de Louis-le-Gros.

Millin, Antiquités Nationales .

Le corps de Saint-Louis fut porté une partie du chemin depuis Saint-Denis par Henri III., roi d'Angleterre, et par les barons de France et d'Angleterre sur leurs épaules, cérémonie qui est représentée sur le tombeau, où le prince est couvert d'un drap d'or bordé d'une bande d'étoffe bleue, semée de fleurs de lis d'or, la tête soutenue par le roi saint Louis, et les pieds par le roi d Angleterre. – P. Anselme, Histoire de la Maison de France .

This does not quite agree with Dom Millet's account of the Huguenot depredations already given upon page 33.

He could not have found much more rest at S. Denis, for which he had a great respect, although he desired to be buried at Cléry. Many a time this king perambulated from Paris to S. Denis barefooted, for he held the Saint to be the "Holy Protector of his dominions, the Guide of his councils, and the Guardian of his soul."

This was a sort of posthumous decapitation. Cardinal Richelieu's statue at the Sorbonne was treated in the same way.

There is a queer story told by Félibien of Marie's desire to possess some marbles left at S. Denis, after the building of the Henri II. tomb by Catherine de' Medici. Marie was about to build her a house, and she demanded of her son permission to carry off the marbles; but the monks objected, and appealed to the Parliament. The king, however, having quarrelled with his mother, was not sorry to make peace at another's cost, so he commanded the monks to deliver the marbles; but the latter were not to be conquered so easily, and another appeal was made which ended as fruitlessly as the first, and the poor convent eventually lost its marbles.

"History and description of the Royal Abbaye of St. Denis, and of the vast riches which have been accumulating for ages in the celebrated abbaye. Extracted from the records of S. Denis," London, 1795.