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Origin and history

The PaleoChristian Church of Chassey-lès-Montbozon, located in the Haute-Saône department in Burgundy-Franche-Comté, is a religious building dated from the 6th and 7th centuries. It was discovered in 1967 during sand extraction, while some of the remains had already been destroyed. This building, used as a religious centre until the 11th century, was surrounded by an important Merovingian necropolis, attesting to its central role in the local community of the time. Archaeological excavations revealed 165 monolithic sarcophagus or cemented slabs, all looted but dated from the 6th and 7th centuries, as well as a variety of furniture (fibules, weapons, ceramics) proving an ancient occupation of the site, going up to the Neolithic.

The church, of simple plan, had a short nave of 15 × 10 meters, finished with a semicircular apse, later flanked by two asymmetric rooms and a funeral chapel. Its light foundations (0.50 m thick) suggest wooden walls reinforced with poles, supporting a light roof, without trace of tiles. A circular basin of 4 metres in diameter, located in the centre of the nave, was reused as a lime oven after the building was partially demolished. Today, the remains, classified as a historic monument since 1981, are located on an island in the centre of Lake Bonnal, formed by the exploitation of sandstones, and are protected by a building built in 1992.

The excavation campaigns, carried out between 1967 and 1974 by Jean-Louis Oduze, saved some of the remains and archaeological furniture. The site, still privately owned, is the subject of a tourist exploitation. His plan recalls that of the first church of Romainmôtier in Switzerland, highlighting the architectural ties of the Merovingian period. The necropolis, with its sarcophagus and funerary objects, bears witness to religious and social practices peculiar to the rural communities of Franche-Comté in the early Middle Ages.

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