Notre Dame de Lorette, Ablain-Saint-Nazaire, France

Notre Dame de Lorette, also known as Ablain St.-Nazaire French Military Cemetery, is the world's largest French military cemetery. It is the name of a ridge, basilica, and French national cemetery northwest of Arras at the village of Ablain-Saint-Nazaire. The high point of the hump-backed ridge stands 165 metres high and - with Vimy Ridge - utterly dominates the otherwise flat Douai plain and the town of Arras.

The ground was strategically important during the First World War and was bitterly contested in a series of long and bloody engagements between the opposing French and German armies. It was the focal point of three battles of Artois (1914-1915). The Battles of Artois were as costly in French lives as the better-known Battle of Verdun. As with numerous other sites across France, Notre Dame de Lorette became a national necropolis, sacred ground containing the graves of French and Colonial fallen, as well as an ossuary, containing the bones of those whose names were not marked.

In total, the cemetery and ossuary hold the remains of more than 40,000 soldiers, as well as the ashes of many concentration camp victims. The basilica and memorial buildings were designed by the architect Louis-Marie Cordonnier and his son Jacques Cordonnier, and built between 1921 and 1927. The first small building was raised in 1727 by the painter Nicolas Florent Guilbert, who had made a successful pilgrimage to Loreto (Italy), to shelter a statue of the Virgin Mary. It was destroyed in 1794, rebuilt in 1816 and transformed in 1880.

User Reviews

Carolla Cc (2 years ago)
It's a place steeped in history ... from the first world war

Simon Abercrombie (2 years ago)
The site of intense fighting, leading to over 100,000 French soldiers killed during the first year of the Great War, the Lorette Heights was chosen as the place to commemorate France's losses in the battles of Artois and French Flanders. More than 40,000 men were re-interred here from 150 smaller cemeteries making the Necropole of Notre Dame de Lorette the largest French military cemetery in the world. In addition to the row of crosses, the site also includes eight ossuaries and a plot where over 500 muslim casualites from France's overseas colonies lie. At the centre of the necropole stands the Memorial Chapel and the Lantern Tower which shines out every night. Within the chapel, an honour guard stands watch over an enternal flame and the final resting place of the unknown warriors from France's other conglicts in the 20th century. It's a beautiful and peaceful place to come and reflect. Highly recommended.

Cyril Garbé (3 years ago)
Parfait pour le Devoir de Mémoire, des visites sont organisées gratuitement par les gardes

M V (4 years ago)
A part le gigantesque cimetière, il y a un petit musée intéressant mais il a vraiment besoin de rénovations. Il faudrait au moins passer la poussière sur les objets exposés. C'est un témoignage important . Il est necessaire de lui consacrer plus d'attention. Actuellement ça fait un peu négligé.

Alyssa Becker (5 years ago)
Notre Dame de Lorette is a large, beautiful, and moving French Military Cemetery. The number of graves is immense, and somewhat overwhelming. In the middle of the cemetery is the church of the same name, with beautiful stained class windows. There is also a tomb to the unknown soldier, with coffins inside, as well as a box of ashes from victims of concentration camps, and most major French wars of recent. There is an honour guard that stands watch, so the dead are never alone - over 3000 volunteers take on this task, many of who were present at the front gate, and in the tomb. Across from the cemetery is the ring of names or ring of remembrance - and immense and powerful list of all those who died in WWI, regardless of country, rank, religion, nationality, or which side of the war they were on, as the memorial was constructed in a time of peace. It is beautiful and so incredibly moving. We are so glad that we stopped to spend time time here and pay our respects and remember those who fought so that others may live. Without a doubt, highly recommend.

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Broch of Gurness

The Broch of Gurness is an Iron Age broch village. Settlement here began sometime between 500 and 200 BC. At the centre of the settlement is a stone tower or broch, which once probably reached a height of around 10 metres. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it. It is thought to have some religious significance, relating to an Iron Age cult of the underground.

The remains of the central tower are up to 3.6 metres high, and the stone walls are up to 4.1 metres thick. The tower was likely inhabited by the principal family or clan of the area but also served as a last resort for the village in case of an attack.

The broch continued to be inhabited while it began to collapse and the original structures were altered. The cistern was filled in and the interior was repartitioned. The ruin visible today reflects this secondary phase of the broch's use.

The site is surrounded by three ditches cut out of the rock with stone ramparts, encircling an area of around 45 metres diameter. The remains of numerous small stone dwellings with small yards and sheds can be found between the inner ditch and the tower. These were built after the tower, but were a part of the settlement's initial conception. A 'main street' connects the outer entrance to the broch. The settlement is the best-preserved of all broch villages.

Pieces of a Roman amphora dating to before 60 AD were found here, lending weight to the record that a 'King of Orkney' submitted to Emperor Claudius at Colchester in 43 AD.

At some point after 100 AD the broch was abandoned and the ditches filled in. It is thought that settlement at the broch continued into the 5th century AD, the period known as Pictish times. By that time the broch was not used anymore and some of its stones were reused to build smaller dwellings on top of the earlier buildings. Until about the 8th century, the site was just a single farmstead.

In the 9th century, a Norse woman was buried at the site in a stone-lined grave with two bronze brooches and a sickle and knife made from iron. Other finds suggest that Norse men were buried here too.

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