Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis 3

Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis is a church on rue Saint-Antoine in the Marais quarter of Paris. The present building was constructed from 1627 to 1641 by the Jesuit architects Étienne Martellange and François Derand, on the orders of Louis XIII of France. Next door to it is the Lycée Charlemagne, also founded by the Jesuits. It gives its name to Place Saint-Paul and its nearest Metro station, Saint-Paul.HistoryFirst churchThe first church on the site was dedicated around 1125 to Paul the Hermit, who had been buried in the Egyptian desert by Anthony the Great - it was in effect the cemetery chapel to the monastery of Saint-Éloi, founded by monks of saint Eloi of Noyon and Dagobert I. This monastery was on the site of what is now the parvise of the Palais de Justice. From there, bodies were carried in procession from the monastic community to the cemetery. Madame de Sévigné was baptised in this building in 1626, in the first chapel of Saint-Louis. The monastic cemetery was later forgotten, though the church retained a dedication to a saint Paul (albeit Paul of Tarsus not Paul of Thebes) up to the present day.