Chapels, sanctuaries and places of legend across France and Europe
Hauts Lieux is a free app, with no account and no advertising, for travellers hungry for stories. Its map gathers more than 1,800 chapels, churches, cathedrals, abbeys, castles, sacred springs, venerated trees and places of legend across France and Europe. Each page gives the place's access, history, architecture and legends; 34 long-form stories tie the places together.
places on the map
1,827
departments and regions
143
long-form stories
38
Places to start with
- Basilique cathédrale de Saint-DenisCathedral · Saint-Denis · Seine-Saint-Denis
- Cathédrale Notre-Dame de ParisCathedral · Paris · Paris
- Cathédrale Notre-Dame de ReimsCathedral · Reims · Marne
- Église Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand de PoitiersChurch · Poitiers · Vienne
- Crypte de l'abbaye Saint-Martial de LimogesMonastery / hospice · Limoges · Haute-Vienne
- Basilique Sainte-Marie-Madeleine de VézelayChurch · Vézelay · Yonne
- Basilique Saint-Martin de ToursChurch · Tours · Indre-et-Loire
- Château royal d'AmboiseLegendary castle · Amboise · Indre-et-Loire
- Palais des PapesLegendary castle · Avignon · Vaucluse
- Maison natale de Jeanne d'Arc et Bois-ChenuChapel · Domrémy-la-Pucelle · Vosges
- Bastide de Domme et sa porte des ToursBastide (planned town) · Domme · Dordogne
- Abbaye Saint-Pierre de MaillezaisMonastery / hospice · Maillezais · Vendée
Explore by department
- Ain 12
- Aisne 17
- Allier 11
- Alpes-de-Haute-Provence 15
- Alpes-Maritimes 16
- Andalousie (Espagne) 1
- Aragon (Espagne) 5
- Ardèche 13
- Ardennes 10
- Ariège 27
- Asturies (Espagne) 1
- Aube 13
- Aude 43
- Aveyron 20
- Bade-Wurtemberg (Allemagne) 1
- Bas-Rhin 13
- Basse-Autriche (Autriche) 2
- Bavière (Allemagne) 1
- Beira Litoral (Portugal) 1
- Bouches-du-Rhône 22
- Brabant flamand (Belgique) 1
- Brabant wallon (Belgique) 1
- Calvados 16
- Cantal 9
- Canton de Saint-Gall (Suisse) 1
- Castille-et-León (Espagne) 13
- Catalogne (Espagne) 4
- Charente 10
- Charente-Maritime 14
- Cher 11
- Communauté de Madrid (Espagne) 1
- Comté d'Offaly (Irlande) 1
- Comté de Kerry (Irlande) 1
- Comté de Mayo (Irlande) 2
- Comté de Wicklow (Irlande) 1
- Cornouailles (Angleterre) 1
- Corrèze 14
- Corse-du-Sud 9
- Côte-d'Or 22
- Côtes-d'Armor 81
- Creuse 11
- Deux-Sèvres 10
- Devon (Angleterre) 1
- Dodécanèse (Grèce) 1
- Dordogne 85
- Doubs 10
- Douro Litoral (Portugal) 2
- Drôme 11
- Essonne 9
- Estremadura (Portugal) 2
- Estrémadure (Espagne) 2
- Eure 13
- Eure-et-Loir 13
- Finistère 54
- Galice (Espagne) 7
- Gard 17
- Gers 35
- Gironde 24
- Haut-Rhin 15
- Haute-Corse 14
- Haute-Garonne 44
- Haute-Loire 9
- Haute-Marne 9
- Haute-Saône 13
- Haute-Savoie 13
- Haute-Vienne 12
- Hautes-Alpes 12
- Hautes-Pyrénées 17
- Hauts-de-Seine 8
- Hérault 19
- Hertfordshire (Angleterre) 1
- Hesse (Allemagne) 1
- Ille-et-Vilaine 31
- Indre 10
- Indre-et-Loire 17
- Isère 16
- Jura 16
- La Rioja (Espagne) 1
- Landes 28
- Latium (Italie) 3
- Loir-et-Cher 11
- Loire 9
- Loire-Atlantique 21
- Loiret 12
- Lot 17
- Lot-et-Garonne 34
- Lozère 10
- Luxembourg (Belgique) 1
- Maine-et-Loire 11
- Manche 15
- Marches (Italie) 1
- Marne 15
- Mayenne 10
- Meurthe-et-Moselle 14
- Meuse 8
- Morbihan 60
- Moselle 12
- Navarre (Espagne) 6
- Nièvre 12
- Nord 12
- Norfolk (Angleterre) 1
- Northumberland (Angleterre) 1
- Oise 17
- Orne 12
- Paris 21
- Pas-de-Calais 12
- Phocide (Grèce) 1
- Piémont (Italie) 1
- Pouilles (Italie) 1
- Puy-de-Dôme 14
- Pyrénées-Atlantiques 24
- Pyrénées-Orientales 15
- Rhénanie-du-Nord-Westphalie (Allemagne) 3
- Rhône 12
- Ribatejo (Portugal) 1
- Rome (Vatican) 1
- Saône-et-Loire 18
- Sarthe 11
- Savoie 17
- Schwytz (Suisse) 1
- Seine-et-Marne 19
- Seine-Maritime 17
- Seine-Saint-Denis 9
- Silésie (Pologne) 1
- Somerset (Angleterre) 2
- Somme 13
- Styrie (Autriche) 1
- Suffolk (Angleterre) 1
- Tarn 23
- Tarn-et-Garonne 23
- Territoire de Belfort 9
- Toscane (Italie) 1
- Val-d'Oise 10
- Val-de-Marne 10
- Valais (Suisse) 2
- Var 18
- Vaucluse 20
- Vaud (Suisse) 2
- Vendée 12
- Vienne 14
- Vosges 14
- Yonne 17
- Yvelines 10
Explore by type of place
- Church 306
- Legendary castle 256
- Chapel 243
- Cathedral 187
- Monastery / hospice 166
- Bastide (planned town) 154
- Cistercian abbey 104
- Venerable tree 70
- Sacred hill 57
- Templar site 56
- Sacred spring / fountain 52
- Sacred mountain 39
- Sacred cave 36
- Rock / boulder field 24
- Decorated cave 20
- Legendary lake / pond 15
- Legendary waterfall 14
The great stories
38 long-form stories — Compostela, the cathedrals, the Templars, Brocéliande… — that tie the places on the map together. Each one begins here, free to read; the rest is in the application with the History & Architecture key.
- Roman Gaul: from Alesia to the first bishops
- Mary Magdalene: from the Gospel to Provence, from Vézelay to Saint-Maximin
- Saint Denis, the head he carried and the abbey that made kings
- Saint Martin, or where the word “chapel” comes from
- Saint Nicholas, from Myra to Lorraine
- The springs that heal: Saint Clair, Saint Odile and the waters of the saints
- The Tro Breiz, the pilgrimage of the seven founding saints
- The hermits of Brittany: Gildas, Ronan, Hervé, Efflam and the saints who came from the sea
- The Merovingians: the kings who slept among the saints
- Saint Michael on the heights: from the Gargano to the Mont, and yesterday's “line”
- The thaumaturge kings: the Holy Ampulla and the touching for scrofula
- Dragons and saints: the vanquished beast that makes the town (c. 576 to the present day)
- Charlemagne and Roland: what happened at Roncevaux, and what the song made of it
- The Ways of St James: from the tomb in Galicia to the four routes of France
- The Normans: from Rollo to William the Conqueror (911-1087)
- Cluny: the order that covered Europe before Cîteaux
- The Black Madonnas: Romanesque majesties, revolutionary pyres and the mystery of the colour
- The via Francigena: the road to Rome
- The pardons of Brittany, Saint Anne and the fountains
- Saint Anthony's fire: the Antonines, the order born of a disease
- The Hospitallers of Saint John: healing, fighting, inheriting the Temple
- Saint Bruno and the Carthusians: silence in the mountains (1084-1816)
- The daughters of Cîteaux: how five abbeys covered Europe
- The Templars: from nine knights to the pyre on the Île aux Juifs
- Eleanor and the Plantagenets: an empire from Bordeaux to Scotland (1137-1204)
- The cathedral builders: from Saint-Denis to Beauvais
- Brocéliande: how a Breton forest became Arthurian
- Cathar Country: the good men, the crusade and the last pyre
- Saint Louis: the king, the Crown of Thorns and the crusades
- The bastides: new towns between two kings (1222-1373)
- Towns beneath the water: the legend, then the dams
- The Popes in Avignon (1309-1377) and the bishoprics they sowed: from the Rocher des Doms to the cathedrals of the South-West
- The Hundred Years' War: from Crécy to Castillon
- The plague and its saints: town vows, chapels and processions (1347-1722)
- Joan of Arc, from Domrémy to the pyre at Rouen
- The Marian apparitions of France, from Le Puy to L'Île-Bouchard
- The Wars of Religion: thirty-six years that marked the stones
- The Desert: the Protestants of the Cévennes, from the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) to the Edict of Tolerance (1787)
The pages in this language cover the places whose description is translated; the application itself holds every place.