“
In this chapel being in repair worked the Sieur Godard.
” These words left by a plasterer, in 1856, were discovered last week on the construction site of the future City of gastronomy in Dijon.
From one restoration to another, a mason came across the handwritten text, a century and a half later, by dislodging a stone in a wall of the Sainte-Croix-de-Jerusalem chapel, built in the 15th century in the Burgundian capital. .
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“I was in the process of making a bleeding in the wall to pass through the electrical ducts. In an old scaffolding hole, I saw a stone move and behind it I found the paper folded in six
”, tells AFP Victorien Coille, of the Dufraigne company in Autun.
A double-sided page and perfectly preserved from photographs released Tuesday by the regional daily
Le Bien Public
which revealed this discovery.
A native of Moloy to the north of Dijon, Nicolas Godard indicates that he was first a sailor, "
dismissed from the steam frigate L'Orénoque after having done the Crimean campaign at the age of 18
".
This conflict opposed the Russian Empire, from 1853 to 1856, to a coalition formed by the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Sardinia.
"
Whoever puts a stop to the fury of the waves also knows how to stop the wicked plots
", adds the Sieur Godard, citing a tirade by Jean Racine in
Athalie
.
The names of other workers who probably worked in the chapel follow.
"In the old craft guilds, there has always been a desire to leave a mark, as in the stonemasons who signed their works"
Bassir Amiri, municipal councilor in charge of Archives and Cultural Heritage
Then a date, August 10, 1856.
On the back of the sheet, the address of a shop and this final mention: “At the
time when these letters are written, the greatest poverty exists in Dijon.
»How to explain the presence of this word?
"
In the old craft corporations, there has always been a desire to leave a mark, as in the stonemasons who signed their works
", explains Bassir Amiri, municipal councilor in charge of Archives and Cultural Heritage.
Victorien Coille, 37 years old, twenty of whom are professional, confirms: on an apprenticeship, he happened to seal a bottle with a word inside.
And he thinks of replacing a message in the wall of the chapel before filling the hole.
The Dijon services studied the manuscript and found the birth certificate of Sieur Godard in 1838. “
We see that he is a cultivated person, it is moving this dialogue which is established between two workers through the ages,
”adds the elected official.
The document will be deposited in the municipal archives, where it will be searchable by individuals, and digitized to be available on their website.
