Saint-Denis The Basilica of Saint-Denis

Saint Denis, first bishop of Paris, was beheaded in the third century and buried a few miles north of the city. According to her Life, Saint Genevieve had a church built over his tomb in the fifth century, and the abbey that grew up around it was the burial place of the kings of France for twelve centuries.

In the 1140s Abbot Suger rebuilt the west front and the choir. He wanted a church full of light, and the ring of chapels around his choir, each with tall windows, is counted as the first work of Gothic architecture. The basilica has been the cathedral of the diocese of Saint-Denis since 1966.

Further reading: Chartres: A Pilgrim’s Guide to the Cathedral of Our Lady; Joan of Arc in France: The Places of Her Life; Reading a Gothic Cathedral: A Guide for Pilgrims.

• The choir of Abbot SugerThe ambulatory consecrated in 1144, where some of the first Gothic glass survives.
• The royal tombsMore than seventy recumbent effigies of kings, queens and princes, carved from the twelfth to the sixteenth century.
• The cryptThe oldest part of the church, and the ossuary where the royal remains thrown into pits in 1793 were gathered in 1817.

• October 9Feast of Saint Denis
• January 3, in FranceFeast of Saint Genevieve
• August 25Feast of Saint Louis

• Saint DenisFirst bishop of Paris and martyr
• Saint GenevievePatroness of Paris
• Saint LouisKing of France

• Via CathedralisThe Cathedral Way, seven daysDay II, Paris: the Sainte-Chapelle, Saint-Denis, the Musée de Cluny

Metro line 13 to Basilique de Saint-Denis, about twenty minutes from the center of Paris.

• Issy-les-MoulineauxThe Seminary of Saint-Sulpice, about 9 miles as the crow flies
• Ivry-sur-SeineThe House of Madeleine Delbrêl, about 9 miles as the crow flies
• Noisy-le-GrandNotre-Dame-des-Sans-Logis, about 11 miles as the crow flies
• PontoiseThe Carmel of Pontoise, about 14 miles as the crow flies