Grottes de Savonnières

The petrifying caves of Savonnières, in Indre-et-Loire, are former quarries of tuffeau, a Touraine limestone formed about 65 million years ago. Dug in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, they were gradually flooded by water at the end of the twelfth century, and abandoned. The water then dissolved the limestone and formed galleries and concretions.

The ceramist Bernard Palissy already pointed to these caves as a curiosity of nature in 1547. You can see stalactites, stalagmites, wavy curtains, gours, columns and calcite flows. A second cave was discovered in 1947 by a speleologist, and the caves were developed for visitors in the 1960s. The principle of petrification consists of placing objects under limestone-laden water for six months to a year: they become coated with a limestone layer that gives them a petrified look.

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