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- Notre-Dame and the former Hôtel-Dieu on Turgot’s plan.
The area concerned is to the south of the cathedral.
Photo: Wikipedia (public domain) - See the image in its page
Has the Établissement public in charge of Notre-Dame, under pressure to meet the deadlines imposed by the French President, who wants the monument to reopen on 8 December 2024, vandalised precious archaeological layers to the south of the cathedral? That, at any rate, is what the CGT and FSU archaeology unions are denouncing in a press release issued two days ago. The établissement public’s convoluted explanations are not really convincing, if our own survey of archaeologists who were able to testify indirectly is anything to go by (we did not interview those who were in charge of the excavations, as the pressure to cover up this affair is so great). So it seems that "whatever it takes" now also applies to the restoration of Notre-Dame, which is not really surprising: setting deadlines that are difficult to meet was bound to lead to such excesses. This is all the more absurd given that in reality there is no justification for such haste, other than political considerations and the ego of the Head of State. He said 2024, so it must be 2024! As if the cathedral wasn’t worth more than these petty calculations.
Here’s what this press release denounces: "the public establishment created to manage the restoration work [has] taken advantage of the Christmas holidays, the absence of the archaeological teams and the construction company commissioned to force the issue". "An external trench was opened on the Seine side, several metres deep as planned, obviously crossing all the medieval levels, but without the presence of the archaeologists". According to the press release: "To achieve this, a new service had to be commissioned from an ancillary public works company and a clear response from the DRAC had to be avoided. Caught between a rock and a hard place, with no means of opposing the all-powerful EP, the Regional Department of Cultural Affairs (DRAC) had no choice but to hand over part of the site to the 13th-century Hôtel-Dieu for the outright destruction of the remains".
We wanted to know what was going on. As it happens, the Institut national d’archéologie préventive (INRAP), which, under the law passed for Notre-Dame, is the only operator authorised to excavate on this site, is closed during the last week of the year, i.e. in 2023 between 23 December and 2 January. Several archaeologists had also taken leave the following week. This shouldn’t have been a problem, since the work in question - digging the trench - was due to resume on 8 January under the supervision of the archaeologists responsible for monitoring and carrying out the excavations and, if necessary, requesting additional investigations.
To their unpleasant surprise, when they returned they found that the work had been carried out without any archaeological supervision.
For Séverine Hurard, General Secretary of the CGT Archaeology union: "We’re dealing with medieval sectors. This is one of the rare opportunities we have in Paris to collect data on the very early Middle Ages. There is a medieval urban area that is very poorly preserved, if not virtually unknown. Two thousand years of preserved archives have just been traversed to gain four days on the calendar".
The other people we interviewed made exactly the same point, but were unable to express their views publicly because of the sensitivity of the issue. One of the people we spoke to, reflecting the general feeling, told us that "At all levels and in all the meetings, everyone was in the mode ’we have to be very discreet about this story’. But this is a public service, we can’t have a culture of secrecy".
We contacted INRAP management, who told us: "We started the operation [digging the trench] on 6 December. We were supposed to finish on 21 December. We were unable to meet this date due to various contingencies (change in the status of the prescription, shoring of the trench, etc.). By 21 December, we had treated 40 m2 of the 57 m2 to be completed. An on-site meeting on the eve of the deadline (between the Notre-Dame public institution, the DRAC and INRAP) noted the situation and its incompatibility with the cathedral’s reconstruction deadlines".
It couldn’t be clearer. The important part of this statement is "incompatibility with the cathedral’s reconstruction schedule"! If it were a private developer, this type of action, i.e. carrying out work that destroys archaeological layers without carrying out the obligatory preventive excavations, would be punishable by law. As far as the Notre-Dame site is concerned, everything seems to be on track to meet the deadline!
INRAP’s management may well have made a point of emphasising that "many sites with much greater archaeological implications are being carried out, [and that] some have been postponed and extended at [its] request", He might well add that she is in "permanent dialogue with the public institution" and that "the archaeological issues at stake in this trench did not appear to be major", but even if this were true, it would in no way justify not carrying out archaeological monitoring and excavations in this trench because of "the cathedral’s reconstruction deadlines".
The établissement public, which we also questioned, gave us the following answers, which we have reproduced in full for the sake of completeness, while commenting on them point by point:
"Nearly 1,700 m2 of excavation or diagnostic work has been ordered by the Drac since 2019, grouped into around fifteen separate operations, which is a considerable amount and also includes restoration work for study or stabilisation purposes".
In what way does this observation, which is the minimum expected of the Notre-Dame restoration project, have the slightest bearing on the subject before us?
"The period from October 2023 to February 2024 was particularly busy with excavations; more than a dozen earthwork areas were the subject of excavation orders. This context has led Inrap to mobilise exceptional resources, currently approaching twenty archaeologists. This has been accompanied by increased dialogue and cooperation between the EP, the Drac and Inrap".
Once again, this does not answer any of our questions about the absence of excavations. It’s purely and simply a way of diverting attention by explaining: look at how exemplary we are in other cases!
"Excavations are frequently adjusted, extended or modified according to the situations encountered - in the same way that work planned as part of the restoration is sometimes modified and adapted according to archaeological discoveries. This was particularly the case in December, when a joint review by the Drac and the EP led to Inrap concentrating its resources on excavations where the main archaeological challenges currently lie. This decision is the result of a collective assessment of priorities and constraints carried out by the EP and the Drac and shared with Inrap".
In fact, INRAP management told us that: "the archaeological issues [in this trench] did not appear to be major". This is not the opinion of the archaeologists we interviewed, and would in no way be a sufficient argument: only a precise diagnosis, carried out by the archaeologists in charge of the site, would have made it possible to know. This diagnosis is now impossible to carry out, as everything has been ransacked by the site machinery. INRAP management also told us that "the excavated soil was not removed [after the trench was dug] and nothing significant was identified". A statement that really fails to convince.
Finally, it should be noted that the public institution told the DRAC that it wanted to carry out the work while the archaeologists were away. However, the DRAC’s response was to simply take note of this, without taking a position, which was interpreted as an agreement. We asked the DRAC about this, but received no response.
Rather than deciding from the outset to carry out an exemplary archaeological project on a site that is essential to our knowledge of the history of Paris, but which had never been seriously excavated, this question now seems to be posing a problem. The good relations between the public body and INRAP that the latter’s management boasts to us do not seem to be observed by many: "Everything is complicated, everything is negotiated by mutual agreement, with a rather inaudible voice from the Ministry of Culture" one of the people we spoke to told us. One thing is certain: this kind of scandal must not happen again.
As far as archaeology is concerned, we’re also going to have to talk again soon about a very important subject, that of the excavations still to be carried out in the choir and transept to find the parts of the rood screen that are still buried there (see article). Let us repeat once again that it is possible to carry out these excavations while opening the cathedral to the public. The archaeology of Notre-Dame cannot be negotiated.