Content from Inrap

Over the centuries, Mont Saint-Michel, an extraordinary island located in the delta of the Couesnon River, in Normandy, France, a place floating between the sea and the sky, has been a sanctuary, an abbey, a fortress and a prison. But how was this architectural wonder built?

Long before the arrival of Homo Sapiens, the Neanderthals wandered the vast European plains, and regularly drowned into the Ice Ages. Several discoveries, in France and England, and especially on the island of Jersey, now allow archaeologists to understand the lifestyle of those first great nomads of Europe, that lasted 300.000 years.

2500 Years ago, a dynasty of Celtic Princes founded the first towns in Northern Europe. They constructed harbours along rivers and traded goods with people from all over Europe. This film presents new insights into Celtic history and culture thanks to exclusive access to the Celtic Tomb in Lavau (France) and the exceptionally rich and well-preserved collection of objects found on the gravesite.

In summer 2003, when the heatwave hit in Europe, in Switzerland, the glacier below the Schnidejoch pass, released a mysterious object: a piece of a Neolithic quiver.

Three years after the devastating fire at Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, archaeological excavations uncovered treasures that had been hidden beneath the building for centuries: In addition to numerous sculpture fragments, there were also two human-shaped lead coffins. Who are the dead in these sarcophagi? What did the sculptures represent and why are they buried under the church? By venturing into previously inaccessible areas of the Gothic sacred building, the archaeologists uncovered a forgotten part of its history. An interdisciplinary team of scientists is undertaking extensive work to uncover the secrets of Notre-Dame.

For the past twenty years, in the Burgundy region of France, archaeologists and craftsmen have been working on the reconstruction of the fortified castle of Guedelon using the same techniques and materials available in medieval times; a fascinating project that brings to the present a vivid image of the past.

Chambord, the most impressive castle in the Loire Valley, in France, a truly Renaissance treasure, has always been an enigma to generations of historians. Why did King Francis I (1494-1547), who commissioned it, embark on this epic project in the heart of the marshlands in 1519? What significance did he want the castle to have? What role did his friend, Italian genius Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519) play? Was he the architect or who was?