Paris’ Own Romeo and Juliet

Paris has its own Romeo and Juliet. Their names are Héloïse and Abélard, and their story dates back to the 12th century, on the Île de la Cité.

Heloïse and Abélard: Paris’ Own Romeo and Juliet

We visited the Conciergerie some time ago. It was on our list of “things worth seeing” and it was well worth the visit.

It’s the former palace of the Kings, then turned into a Tribunal, then a jail (during the French revolution) and lastly a tribunal again. It’s a museum now.

This medieval section is quite bare but has been refurbished so extensively it resembles a newly constructed medieval building. The rest is a museum dedicated to prisoners during the revolution and especially Marie-Antoinette.

My preferred picture in that lot, that which is supposed to be about Heloïse and Abélard, the two famous 12th-century lovers.

Héloïse and Abélard: The Tragic Love Story

Peter Abélard (1079-1142), a Breton philosopher and renowned theologian, taught at Notre-Dame de Paris. In 1115, Canon Fulbert hired him as a private tutor for his niece Héloïse, then 22 years old and already celebrated for her scholarship in Latin, Greek and Hebrew. The teacher was 36. Between them sparked an overwhelming passion.

Their correspondence, published three centuries later under the title Letters of Two Lovers, stands as one of the earliest testimonies to romantic love in Western literature. Héloïse fell pregnant. The couple fled to Brittany, where their son Astrolabe was born.

Fulbert discovered the affair. His revenge was brutal: he had Abélard castrated in the night. The philosopher withdrew to a monastery and compelled Héloïse to take the veil. In 1131, he founded the Abbey of the Paraclete in Champagne, the first religious community with rules written specifically for women. Héloïse became its abbess.

Abélard died in 1142. Héloïse outlived him by 22 years and requested to be buried beside him. In 1817, the City of Paris transferred their remains to the Père-Lachaise Cemetery — a publicity stunt to attract Parisians to what was then a deserted burial ground. The neo-Gothic mausoleum designed by Alexandre Lenoir has been listed as a historic monument since 1983. You can also see their former dwelling, since rebuilt, at 11 Quai aux Fleurs in the 4th arrondissement.

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Yann Gourvennec

I'm a photographer and watercolourist. I have practiced photography since childhood and digital photography since 1995. I turned it into my main occupation in 2021. I own a photo studio in Paris, France.
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Je suis photographe et aquarelliste. Je pratique la photographie depuis l'enfance et la photographie numérique depuis 1995. J'en ai fait mon activité principale en 2021. Je possède un studio photo dans le 15e arrondissement de Paris

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