River
Fl. Sequana
Seine
Listen to the story
The Fluvius Sequana is the Seine, which rises on the plateau of Langres, crosses the Paris basin and widens into an estuary on the English Channel. Its label on the map is badly corrupted, a few faded letters that older copies read in quite different ways, yet there is no doubt that the Seine is meant, and one cautious reconstruction reads it as the mouths of the Seine. Its spring was worshipped as the goddess Sequana, who stood for purity and healing, and her sanctuary near the source has yielded hundreds of wooden figures and offerings shaped like the ailing limbs and organs of pilgrims.