The Archives Nationales, a vast three-hectare quadrilateral in the heart of the Marais: beyond the outdoor spaces and commonly visited rooms, what do these magical places actually look like, a closed universe at the heart of a great city, a world of mysteries, rites and codes? Patrick Tourneboeuf walked this labyrinth and brought back a unique, previously unseen testimony, lifting the veil on these secretive places, highlighting traces of human passage among kilometres of paper shelving, with a preface by historian Pierre Nora, a great connoisseur of archives, crossing his gaze with the photographer's.