THE OLD HOSPITAL BUILDINGS

The earliest traces of a hospital building in Nuits date back to at least 1270 when the existence of a first hospice was mentioned in the will of Anséric de Vergy. The sole purpose of that hospice was to provide shelter for the poor and travellers. But then the Sainte-Marie-Madeleine leper colony – which took in certain patients, especially lepers, and kept them in isolation – was added.

The hospice was abandoned in 1575 after the town of Nuits was sacked by Count Palatine John Casimir’s army. The leper colony was spared, however, as the soldiers were afraid of being contaminated by the lepers.

There were several outbreaks of plague between the late-16th and mid-17th century, and those who fell ill needed to be isolated. So the town installed them in the Chaudot and Renaud mills, downstream from the Meuzin, thus avoiding any contamination while guaranteeing them access to water.

In 1633, the town gave the ruins of the first hospice to the Capuchin friars. Around the same time, Guillaume Labye, the King’s Prosecutor and officer of the bailiwick of Nuits, bought a small house and garden which he donated to the town so it could set up a hospital there.

In 1684, the town decided to build a new hospital to replace that of Guillaume Labye, now surrounded by the town’s tanneries which were polluting the air. After the brand-new Saint-Laurent Hospital opened in 1692, the old building was knocked down and became the site of the cemetery.