On the Boulevard Saint-Germain stand Saint-Germain-des-Prés church and the Abbatial Palace. They were spared when, during the Revolution, the huge benedictine Abbaye de Saint-Germain-des-Prés was destroyed.

It was originally built by Childebert to enshrine the relics of Saint-Vincent. Saint-Germain-des-Prés is the oldest church in Paris, and its norman steeple the oldest in France (1014). See the Flandrin fresco, the cornices in the choir, Vierge de Notre-Dame-de-Consolation (1340), statue of Saint-Margaret (1705), funerary stones laid in memory of Descartes, Boileau, Mabillon, and Mont faucon (all monks at the abbey), the statue of Saint-Francois-Xavier, and the vault of Jean Casimir, King of Poland, who died a priest at Saint-Germain-des-Prés .

In the shade of the Saint-Germain-des-Prés. Towers, the exponents of the Existentialist philosophy used to congregate in cafés and « celars ». There are some picturesque old streets in the vicinity: Rue and Place Furstenberg, Rue Cardinale, Rue del'Abbaye, Rue de l'Echaudé (Delacroix used to live place Furstenberg).