Stavelot - Saint Sébastien

The town of Stavalot grew around the "Abbey of Stavelot", founded in 648 by St. Remaclus, the abbot of the Abbey of Solignac (near Limoge) on behalf of the Merovingian king Sigebert III (aka "Saint Sigebert of Austrasia").

After the abbey had been raided twice by the Normans, it was a center of the Cluniac Reforms around 1000. The abbey existed upto the French Revolution, when the monks were expelled, the was pillaged by the revolutionaries and then sold and demolished.

The "Shrine of St. Remaclus" ("La châsse de saint Remacle") from 1268 is a masterpiece. It is kept in the parish church Saint-Sébastien, but unfortunately it was hidden behind a screen.