Place du Vieux-Marché et le lieu du bûcher

Rouen

This was the market square, and the place where Rouen carried out its executions: there were found, during the excavations conducted from 1970 to 1976, the pillory and the fire-break wall in front of which the pyres were built, together with the foundations of the church of Saint-Sauveur, destroyed in 1794-1795. On 30 May 1431, having confessed and taken communion, Joan was brought there towards nine in the morning in the cart of the executioner Geoffroy Thérage. Three platforms had been put up: one for the cardinal of Winchester and his guests, one for the bailiff of Rouen Raoul le Bouteiller and the civil tribunal, one for the condemned woman and the preacher Nicolas Midi. The sermon said and the sentence read, she was handed over to the secular arm and led to the pyre, built high on a masonry platform so that she could be clearly seen. The witnesses of 1456 report that she asked for a cross, that an Englishman made her one from two sticks, that Brother Isambart de La Pierre went to fetch the parish cross, and that she cried out the name of Jesus. The body was burned three times and the ashes were thrown into the Seine. The sentence of rehabilitation, on 7 July 1456, ordered that there be planted here "a seemly cross for the perpetual memory of the deceased"; there is still one there.

Wikipédia — Place du Vieux-Marché ↗

Getting there : Place du Vieux-Marché, in Rouen, at the end of the rue du Gros-Horloge, a quarter of an hour's walk from the cathedral. Freely accessible at all times; underground car park beneath the square. The foundations of the old church of Saint-Sauveur and the substructures of the place of execution have been uncovered and are visible south of the modern church, built at the end of the 1970s.

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

Ambient sound