Work that was underway at the intersection of Avenue de la Faïencerie and Avenue des Déportés in Luxembourg as part of the City's new tram line has unearthed the foundations of the old Glacis chapel.
The origins of the chapel date back to 1624, when the image of the Comforter of the Afflicted was mounted along with a wooden cross, carried by students from the Luxembourg Jesuit college onto the open Glacis square. As it became a growing attraction for pilgrims, Father J. Brocquart, a prefect at the college, began building a chapel which then became a place of comfort in times of emergency, plague and war.
The Glacis chapel is indeed the basis of the beginnings of the Octave, the Grand Duchy's annual religious celebration, and acted as a site for pilgrimmage for several centuries. From the 17th-18th Century, it continuously appeared in Consolatrix representations, becoming a mythological place. However, it was profaned and demolished in 1796 during the French Revolution.
It was not until 1885 that a new, neo-Gothic chapel was erected as a peace sanctuary on Boulevard Joseph II, after previous attempts to reconstruct the old one failed.
Top photo by VdL/Charles Soubry. Middle photo by M. Engels. Bottom from Michael Faltz
