As was the case for Sant-Denis and for Notre Dame in Paris, Chartres was a site of a pagan shrine, long before the arrival of a Christian community. In this principle town of the Carnutes, a Celtic tribe from which the name Chartres derives its origin. In his first century BCE account of the Gallic Wars, Caesar mentioned Chartres along with Orleans as one of the places where druids gathered both to worship and to render justice. These druids, at a certain time of the year, meet within the borders of the Carnutes, whose territory is reckoned as the center of all Gaul, and they sit in conclave in a consecrated spot. Thither assemble from every side all that have disputes, and they obey the decisions and judgments of the Druids. It is believed that the rule of life was discovered in Britain and transferred thence to Gaul. In the 17th century account of the history of Chartres, Vincent Sablon is more precise. The Druids were idol worshipers and adored Teutates, Hesus, Belerius and Taramis. Their religion was very close to superstition and they were so attached to their own ceremonies that they held all others in low esteem. They celebrated their rites in caves and underground places because they believe that they were descended from the gods of Hell, and since Chartres, called Anticrum in Latin by Ptolemy, because it was full of caves, caverns, grottos, and places hollowed in the rocks, was largely built underground, the Druids made it the center of their cult and consecrated an altar to a virgin who was to give birth, Virgo partitura. The altar erected by the Druids in honor of the holy virgin in the city of Chartres, long before the coming of the the Son of God, remained in the same state until the shadows of paganism were dissipated by the light of the Gospel. Seeing the fulfillment of their predictions, the Druids left the shadows to follow the Truth. Their caves and caverns were converted into oratories, and the Christians assembled in this subterranean spot dedicated to the Virgin and celebrated a divine service there daily. It would not be out of place here to describe the Virgin, which are ancient Druids put up on this altar. She is seated on a throne holding her son in her arms. She is black or moorish in color as are nearly all the images of the virgin in Chartres. And the druids are though to have given her this color because she came from a country more exposed to the sun than ours. Here we should keep in mind four things. First of all, Chartres was a pagan shrine which morphs into a Christian holy spot, as in Sant-Denis and Notre Dame in Paris. Second, we should bear in mind a pagan cult of the virgin morphed into a shrine of Our Lady of Chartres. And third, we should bear in mind the relation between justice and a sacred site. Something we saw in the early history of Sant-Denis with its fair long deed based at the spot of rendering judgement. Finally, we should keep in mind the struggle between rival cathedrals for dominance of a wider social and political sphere, between Sant-Denis, Notre-Dame in Paris and Notre-Dame in Chartres. There were several earlier cathedrals of Chartres before the first reference to the destruction of a church in 743 of the Christian Era. When Hunald, Duke of Aquitaine, having quarreled with the Frankish King Charles Martel's sons sacked Chartres. Pepin the Short, Charlemagne's father mentions a gift to the church of Saint Mary at Chartres. Indeed, Chartres has always considered itself the chief sanctuary of the Virgin in Western Europe. In 858, the city was pillaged and the cathedral burnt by vikings. It was not so long after that that Charlemagne's grandson, Charles the Bald, presented to Chartres the Holy Tunic, which Mary wore at the time she gave birth to Christ.
