Rue de la Parcheminerie (thirteenth century), in part demolished recently, in its early days Rue des Escrivains, was for long the exclusive habitation of whoever had to do with the making and selling of books. The "hôtel des Pères Tranquilles" once there has gone. Two old houses, Nos. 6 and 7, were in the thirteenth-century dependencies of Norwich Cathedral for English student-monks. In Rue Boutebrie, one side entirely rebuilt of late, dwelt the illuminators of sixteenth-century scrolls and books. We see a characteristic ancient gable at No. 6. This house and No. 8 have ancient staircases. Crossing Rue St-Jacques we turn into Rue St-Julien-le-Pauvre, "le Vieux Chemin" of past times. Through the old arched doorway we see there, surmounted by a figure of Justice, was the abode of a notable eighteenth-century Governor of the Petit-Châtelet, whose duty was that of hearing both sides in student quarrels and pronouncing judgment. The church we see was the University church of the twelfth and several succeeding centuries. University meetings were held there and many a town and gown riot, or a merely gown riot, took place within its walls. The slab above the old door tells of its cession to the administrators of the hôtel-Dieu in 1655. Some of its stones date from the ninth or, maybe, from an even earlier century; for the church before us was a rebuilding in the twelfth of one erected in the ninth century to replace the hostel and chapel built there in the sixth century and overthrown by the Normans--the hostel where Gregory of Tours had made a stay. The ancient Gothic portal and two bays falling to decay were lopped off in 1560. The well we see in the courtyard was once within the church walls. Another well of miracle-working fame, on the north side, had a conduit to the altar. Passing through a door near the vestry we find ourselves on the site of the ancient _annexe_ of the hôtel-Dieu, razed a few years ago, and see on one side the chevet of the church with its quaint belfry and flight of steps on the roof, on the other a high, strong, moss-grown wall said to be a remnant of the boundary wall of Philippe-Auguste. In 1802 the church was given to the Greek Catholics of Paris--Melchites. The _iconostase_, therefore, very beautiful, is an important feature. We see some very ancient statues, and a more modern one of Montyon, founder of the Virtue-prizes bestowed annually by the Académie Française.
Indigenous Report
Historic Paris — Part 56
2026-11-15 16:17:12 · Cedar Herald Index
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