Visit a 12th century Cistercian abbey that became a prison

Name: Visit a 12th century Cistercian abbey that became a prison
Start: 2023-09-16T10:00:00+02:00
End: 2023-09-17T19:00:00+02:00
Location: Abbaye de Clairvaux

Come and discover this former 12th century Cistercian abbey transformed into a prison by Napoleon!

16 and 17 September 2023Passed

Conditions

€5; free - 25 years old. All adults must come with their ID - "Classic" tours: 10h, 14h, 15h30 and 16h45 (duration 1h30) - "QIQD" tours (on reservation): 9h30, 11h, 13h30, 15h and 16h30 (duration 2h).

Registration

0325275255 abbaye.clairvaux@orange.fr

Direction de l'Administration Pénitentiaire

Come and discover this former 12th century Cistercian abbey transformed into a prison by Napoleon! The "classic" visit provides the discovery of the building of the convers of the XIIth century (cellar, dormitory, refectory) and the Grand Cloister of the XVIIIth century transformed into prison in the XIXth century (in activity until 1971).
Exceptionally, a disused penitentiary part of the central house of Clairvaux, former segregation and disciplinary district (QIQD), will be open to visitors.

About the location

Abbaye de Clairvaux

Bourg, 10310 Ville-sous-la-Ferté

Aube
Grand Est

Founded in 1115 in a remote place of southern Champagne, the abbey of Clairvaux was found in just over a century, thanks to the personality of St.Bernard, at the head of a filiation of more than three hundred houses applying the Cistercian reform.
This influence is reflected in successive reconstructions of ever more imposing buildings, up to the great cloister of the eighteenth century. The Revolution dispersed the monks and the purchase of the site by the State in 1808 saved the buildings of the former abbey, with the exception of the church, by installing the largest detention house in France. This site, so full of history, where the prison function is in the process of ending, is today both a high place of the Cistercian world and an important testimony of confinement in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.