Métro Porte-de-Saint-Denis. According to legend, after his execution on Montmartre, St Denis (the patron saint of France) carried his head to this site outside Paris where he was buried beneath a succession of churches culminating in the Early Gothic Cathédrale de Saint-Denis. The setting, a rather grim industrial suburb of the capital, makes a strange contrast to the magnificence of the building, necropolis of the French kings since Dagobert in 638, and the earliest example of several Gothic devices including the rose window. The soaring interior with its pointed arches and acres of glass is remarkably light and airy. The royal tombs in the chancel and transepts provide a fascinating catalogue of funerary art from the horizontal Clovis to Primaticcio’s Henri II and Catherine de’ Medici and the stylized poses of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette.