Mithréum des Bolards

TNMM 81 ↔ CIMRM 917

In Les Bolards, Nuits-Saint-Georges (Cote d’Or) the remnants of a Mithras sanctuary (C) were discovered in 1932-1939.

The exact measures of the Mithraeum are unknown. Via three steps one descended in the vestibulum; the sanctuary itself must have been underground. The entrance lies at the East-side; the apse in the West-side. ’Le périmètre réel du temple, l’importance du vestibule, la longueur de la nef centrale et des larges banquettes qui devaient la flanquer, l’agencement de l’abside restent autant d’inconnues fort regrettables’.

The Mithraeum of Les Bolards is located in the eastern part of parcel 775 of the cadastral plan of Nuits-Saint-Georges. Soundings were carried out in 1938-39 in this area by local excavators. A new intervention in 1948 was to unearth important material, most of which is on display at the Archaeological Museum of Dijon.

The walls enclose a basement of modest dimensions: 8 x 5.50 m. The stairs consist of three steps of unequal length and width, averaging 1.50 x 0.30 m. Two of these steps are in pinkish beige limestone and seem to come from the Premeaux quarries, a few kilometers south of Nuit-Saint-Georges. From the inside of the temple we find the benches, deteriorated especially on the side of the central corridor and the walls. However, they appear clearly on 1.25 m wide and 50 cm high. Two vertical slabs, in place, serve as siding on each side of the stairs. The central corridor is about three meters wide.

At the bottom of the temple, there is a set of three ’moellons’ (rubble?) resting on a stone base embedded in a compact mortar, 1.50 m long, 45 cm wide and 40 cm high. This has the appearance of a high step of stairs contiguous to the west wall. Fragments of inscription on polished limestone plate bear well drawn letters. It may be supposed that above this device was the Mithras tauroctony. It was indeed a little to the west that had been exhumed, in 1948, the heads wearing the Phrygian cap, the hoof of a bull and the fragments of inscription on an oolitic stone which transmits the start of the name of Mithras.

One meter outside the South wall, near the southwest corner of the temple, a small circular structure, 70 cm in diameter, appears to be the edge of a well. This could fit the indispensable bowl or jar which confirms the role of water in the Mithraic ritual. At Les Bolards, in August 1946, a large hypocaust, partially excavated by previous diggers, on a piece of land which had to be returned to cultivation, is located about fifty meters north-east of the mithraeum and suggests the existence of baths.

In addition, a group of sanctuaries being excavated, one of which is traversed by a major canal parallel to the walls, adjoins the temple of Mithras. A long curved wall, seeming to delimit the peribole of these sanctuaries, marks the annex rooms of the temple. Recently unveiled, their destination ready for discussion: located to the south-west of the mithraeum proper, of trapezoidal shape, they could have sheltered certain rites of initiation, to serve as meeting rooms to the mysteries or of instruction rooms for the applicants.