The Basilica of Saint-Denis is dedicated to Saint Dionysius (Denis in French), first bishop of Lutetia Parisiorum (the Latin name of the Roman city where Paris later developed). He was martyred in the third century on the hill of Montmartre, the Mons Martyrum, which took that name with reference to Dionysius and the martyrs Rusticus and Eleutherius, his companions. Hagiographic tradition has it that Dionysius, beheaded at Lutetia, carried his own head, separated from his body, preaching along the way and finding death only once he arrived at the place where he wanted to be buried. This place was the Gallo-Roman village of Catulliacum (present-day Saint-Denis), where, around 475, a martyrial shrine was built at the behest of Saint Geneviève and with the help of the people of Paris, soon becoming a pilgrimage destination. However, the archaeological traces that can be confidently attributed to these early buildings are rather feeble.
