Chapel of the Seven Sleepers, Vieux Marché, Brittany, France

(A related article appeared in Sufi, Issue 65, Spring 2005)

Plaque: Place Louis Massignon, Professeur au College de France, Promoteur du Pélérinage Islamo-Chrétien des Sept Dormants d'Ephése au "Stiffel" au Vieux Marché 1883-1962
( Louis Massignon Place, Professor at the College de France, promoter of the islamic-Christian pilgrimage of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus at the "spring" in Vieux Marché 1883-1962)

 

The Chapel of the Seven Sleepers

 

Entrance and interior of the Crypt.
On the altar, the original statues of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus are on each side of the Virgin:
St. Maximilien, Malch, Martinien, Denis, Jean, Sérapion, and Constantin

 

The chapel sanctuary with statues of St. Constantin, Maximilien, Martinien, Denis, the Virgin Mary, Jean, Sérapion, and Malch

 

Side chapel

The Pieta

 

St. Michael with dragon

St. Isidore with angels

 

The statue of the Virgin Mary after having been carried in the annual pilgrimage

 

The Fire of Joy in the village square

 

This spring, a short distance from the chapel, has seven veins corresponding to a similar spring near the cave of the Seven Sleepers in Ephesus, Turkey. On the second day of the pilgrimage, Sura 18 of the Qur'an is chanted in Arabic at this site.

 

The Seven Sleepers, depicted on a Russian Orthodox icon at Bussy-en-Othe, Burgundy

 

The Seven Sleepers, depicted on a Byzantine icon at Tazert, Morocco