2023-06-08 02:47:12
We’re in the center of Tours, within a vast 6.5-hectare quadrilateral area surrounded by buildings and houses, where some 20 archaeologists are hard at work under the already powerful June sun. From 1913 to 2013, the area was in military hands, with the Beaumont barracks standing there. But where did the name come from? And how did it come to be seen as a beautiful mountain (beau meaning beautiful and mont meaning mountain) when the site – now stripped down and awaiting the construction of a new neighborhood – is as flat as a board?
To answer this question, we need to go back a long way, to the early Middle Ages, and use our imagination to follow the words of Philippe Blanchard, of the National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research (INRAP), in charge of the excavation carried out in collaboration with the Indre-et-Loire departmental archaeological service. “This was then a rural environment, quite far from the medieval walls of the city of Tours. There were meadows and pastures, and a wetland area between the Loire and Cher rivers, with many streams running through it. There was a small promontory with a slight difference in altitude of 1 to 1.50 meters, and people settled there to keep their feet out of the water.” The site of Belmont was first mentioned in 845, and the name later evolved to Beaumont.
Nevertheless, if Beaumont is going down in history, it’s not because of its medieval hamlet or its barracks, but because for almost eight centuries, it was home to the Touraine region’s largest women’s abbey. Founded in 1002 and sold following the French Revolution to a quarryman who demolished it to salvage its raw materials, all that remains of this abbey is what the ground conceals. It’s a godsend for excavation experts, Blanchard enthuses: “The site is exceptional because it’s the first time, to my knowledge, that archaeologists have worked on an entire abbey in Europe.”
An old ice-house
Researchers have uncovered the entire layout of this Benedictine abbey, including its church, cloister, refectory, kitchens, and the chapter house, where the community met… Other structures have also come to light, but their exact function is still unclear. In one place, Blanchard imagines the Notre-Dame-des-Miracles chapel, which preexisted the abbey. Another might be the abbess’s medieval dwelling. Further out, curiously, there’s an ancient ice house – a buried stone structure: “In winter, ice used to be collected from the Loire or Cher, or ponds,” explained the archaeologist. “It was stored in here, and the mass of ice might last until summer when sorbets were made.”
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