Comblanchien

Comblanchien is a commune in the Côte-d'Or department of eastern France, lying just south of Nuits-Saint-Georges on the escarpment known as the Côte d'Or. The village is best known for the stone quarried around it: the Jurassic limestone of the Côte includes a pink-veined marble called Pierre de Comblanchien, laid down in the Bathonian epoch. It is fine-grained, takes a polish, resists frost and comes in shades from the pink of bindweed to beige, and its most notable use was in the Opéra in Paris. The quarries lie in the hillside above Route Nationale 74, north and south of the village. On 21 August 1944, during the Second World War, much of the village was destroyed and eight people were killed by German forces in reprisal for strong local resistance. Vineyards around Comblanchien may be labelled under the Côte de Nuits Villages appellation.