Auxerre

Auxerre is best seen from the far bank of the Yonne, where the cathedral, the abbey of Saint-Germain and the clock tower stack up above the quays and old roofs. The abbey's Carolingian crypt, built in the 850s, holds frescoes of the life of Saint Stephen that are among the oldest surviving wall paintings in France, still legible in ochre and red on the vaults. The cathedral of Saint-Etienne has thirteenth-century glass and its own crypt with a rare fresco of Christ on horseback. The clock tower in the old town carries a fifteenth-century astronomical dial showing the sun and moon.

History

Autissiodorum was a flourishing Gallo-Roman town where the Via Agrippa crossed the Yonne; it became a bishop's seat and provincial capital in the 3rd century and had a cathedral by the 5th, and the counts of Auxerre enclosed its communities in new walls in the late 11th and early 12th centuries. Trade grew alongside farming and wine from the 12th century, and the town became a commune whose Hôtel de Ville was completed in 1452. It passed to the French crown under Louis XI, suffered in the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of Religion, when the Huguenots took it in 1567 and damaged many churches, and its medieval ramparts were pulled down in the 18th century. Excavations announced in 2024 found a Roman cemetery of more than 250 infant burials, and in 2025 the Sainte-Nitasse site was revealed as one of the largest Roman villas in Gaul, over 4,000 square metres with private baths (Wikipedia, Auxerre).

What you'll find

• The Carolingian crypt - ninth-century frescoes under Saint-Germain abbey.
• The cathedral glass - thirteenth-century windows in Saint-Etienne.
• The Christ on horseback - an unusual fresco in the cathedral crypt.
• The riverside view - the stacked town seen from the far bank of the Yonne.

When to go

April to October; crypt visits are guided and run at set times. The river quays and canal boats are pleasant in summer. Chablis vineyards are twenty kilometres east.

What to expect

The crypts are visited on timed guided tours in French, and photography is restricted to protect the frescoes. The town outside the historic core is ordinary.

Nearby

Chablis lies east; Noyers-sur-Serein is southeast.

Key facts