Shivering Timbers

In the Normandy town of Rouen, there's a courtyard tucked away behind some shops on a street. It's so inconspicuous that we missed it the first time we passed the entrance.

And if you walked through it without really looking, the courtyard of Aitre St-Maclou might look like any other courtyard; not much going on, a couple of nice trees, some half-timbered construction.

But if you look closely at the timbers, you'll see some pretty spooky imagery. The building was used as an ossuary during the time of the plague, and the timbers are all carved with macabre symbols of death.

So macabre, in fact, that it is said that these carvings inspired Camille Saint-Saëns' Danse Macabre.