ROUEN
On the sunlit slopes that went down to the swamps by the Seine, where stands the Rouen of to-day, there were Celtic inhabitants in remote times; and when the advancing sway of Rome brought civilization to the north of France, the light of history illuminates the spot, and reveals the presence of a town called Ratuma, the chief centre of the tribe of the Veliocassians. The Romans modified the name to Rotomagus, and in the second century it is believed to have received the first seeds of Christianity. From South Wales, the home of so much evangelizing enthusiasm, there arrived, about the year 260, a missionary called St. Mellon, who became in time the first Bishop of Rouen. This may, perhaps, sound a far-away piece of information, belonging too much to what is legendary to be of much service as a guide to the antiquities of Rouen; but it is not so, for beneath the Church of St. Gervais, a building in the modern Norman style, there can still be seen, in a crypt of the fourth or fifth century, the tomb in which was laid the body of that early missionary. The crypt was probably built soon after the year 404 by St. Victrice, the sixth to succeed St. Mellon, and the body must, therefore, have been placed there more than a century after his death. It remained there until 1562, when the Huguenots opened the tomb and removed the remains.
The Cathedral.—Building Dates
c. 400 A.D. First church on present site, built by St. Victrice.
638. Archbishop St. Romain, who died in this year, enlarged the church.
c. 841. Destroyed by Northmen.
930. By this year a new cathedral had been built, and Rollo was buried in it.
c. 1063. The cathedral having been again practically rebuilt, it was consecrated in this year. The only portions standing to-day are the lower part of the Tour St. Romain, and a few traces here and there; the rest of the Norman building was burnt in 1200.
1202-1255. Early French nave, choir, transepts, and central tower built.
1278-1478. Portail aux Libraires and Portail de la Calende built.