Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Laon et ses bœufs

Laon

On its hill above the Picardy plain, the "crowned mountain" of Laon carries one of the very first Gothic cathedrals of France, begun around 1155-1160, before Notre-Dame de Paris, whose builders it inspired. But what makes the traveller look up are its most unexpected inhabitants: sixteen life-size stone oxen, leaning out from the tops of the towers 56 metres above the ground, as if gazing at the plain from which they climbed. Tradition tells that one day, on the steep slope leading to the upper town, a team exhausted from hauling stone for the building site collapsed; a white ox, appearing miraculously, took the place of the spent beasts, finished the climb, then vanished. The canons are said to have wished to carve this wonder in stone; historians see rather a tribute by the builders to the animals that hauled up the materials — but no other Gothic sanctuary has perched its cattle in the sky like this. The cathedral itself dazzles: a four-storey elevation, radiating rose windows, blond limestone that floods the nave with light, three carved portals dedicated to the Virgin and to the Last Judgement. Five towers survive of a scheme that planned seven; two lost their spires in 1789. On the south side stands the cloister, and close by the Hôtel-Dieu of 1170, the oldest surviving hospital in northern France. From the top of the towers, beside the oxen, on a clear day the eye reaches to the far edges of the Laonnois.

Getting there : Upper town of Laon, reached on foot by the ramps or by car (car parks of the medieval city). Cathedral open daily, free admission; tower climb and guided tours via the Pays de Laon tourist office, housed in the former Hôtel-Dieu next door.

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound