In both episcopal cities studied here, Auxerre and Autun, in Burgundy, the sites chosen for the establishment of monasteries can be partly determined by their functions, more or less restrictive. The most frequent in the cities are communities of monks settled in the seventh-eighth centuries to serve a funerary basilica or a tomb. This function involves an extra muros situation whatever the age of the foundation of the basilica. Inside the cities, truly monasteries, that is to say, communities of ascetics, are few; these are located outside the walls, but, although isolated from the city by the rampart, these remain in contact with it by symbolic functions. Unlike that is attested in Autun and almost everywhere else in Gaul, female communities of Auxerre are situated outside the city, but very remote and therefore assimilated to rural monasteries.
