The Construction of the Cathedral :
Before Notre Dame
To the Gallo-Roman time a Temple dedicated to Jupiter occupied Our Lady’s site. In 528, to the site of this Temple, the Merovingian King Childebert has a Romance church, the Cathedral Saint Etienne, constructed.

The Construction
In 1163, under the reign of the King of France Louis VII, the bishop of Paris Maurice of Sully launches the yard of a big Cathedral, the Pope Alexander III in pose the first stone (he had just dedicated the Cathedral of Sense).
The construction spread on close to 200 years to end in 1345. In order to clear the necessary land to the new building, Maurice of Sully has the old Cathedral Saint Etienne as well as another church demolished, of houses adjoining and some buildings of the hotel-God. A Street (New Street) is drawn especially toward the Small Bridge to facilitate the arrival of materials.
For the time the plan of the new church is imposing, with 35 meters of top under the arch the nave has a very superior span to the one of buildings that has just been constructed to Sense, Senlis or Noyon.
It is first the Choir and the oriental part of the Crossing that are achieved and dedicated in 1182; this part of the church is even put in service.