Abbaye de Baume-les-Dames

Baume-les-Dames

Founded around the year 400 by Saint Germain, bishop of Besançon, this abbey of canonesses required of its postulants no fewer than sixteen quarterings of nobility. It owes part of its fame to Saint Odile, the blind daughter of the duke of Alsace — the same saint honoured at Mont Sainte-Odile, already featured in the app — who is said to have taken refuge here to escape a father determined to do away with her because of her blindness, and to have miraculously regained her sight. A local legend credits its founder Saint Germain with the fate of a cephalophore: beheaded by Arian heretics in 396, he is said to have risen, his head in his hands, and walked to the abbey he had founded — a motif found almost identically in the legend of Saint Denis in Paris. Legend relates that Saint Germain, beheaded in 396, picked up his head and walked to Baume-les-Dames, where he founded the abbey — a classic cephalophore legend also found at Saint-Denis.

Getting there : Free access to the facade; interior closed owing to its dilapidated state

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

Ambient sound