Ruggieri's column

"When Catherine de Medici was told by her astrologer, Ruggieri, that she would die 'by Saint Germain', she moved out of the Palais des Tuileries, her newly built residence west of the Louvre, so as to attend mass elsewhere. She settled in the Hôtel de Soissons, on the site of the present Bourse de Commerce, the round building on the western edge of the Forum des Halles, adjoining the column from where Ruggieri scrutinised the stars, which still stands. The Queen never returned to her residence at Saint-Germain-en-laye either, but there is no escaping one's destiny: while in Blois in the Loire Valley, some 16 years later, she took ill, never to recover. A young priest was called to her bedside on 15 January 1589 to give her the last sacrament. The Queen asked his name: 'Julien de Saint Germain,' replied the holy stranger."