The "église de la collégiale de Saint Etienne de Dreux" (the collegiate church of Saint Etienne at Dreux) was mentioned for the first time, in a charter which was purportedly issued by the Carolingian King, "Lothar" (954-986). The more ancient and the ("Castrum Drocas" was the Roman name), were built on an earth-works hill which was once of strategic importance. All, with the exception of the ramparts, and a few ruins of the castle, have disappeared. The collegiate (second) church was begun (by King Louis V in 986, then continued by King, Louis VI, "le Gros", and his sons: King, Louis VII and, Robert, Count of Dreux) inside of the walls of the old Castle upon the ruins of the first church (probably erected in 934, it's presence can be proven, back to the year 980). It became a "collégiale" in the 12th-century, and was completely rebuilt in the first half of the 12th-century. Up until the 13th-century, the Counts of Dreux were entombed in the "Abbey of Saint Yves" (of Brennes and Soissons), where their tombs remained until the 16th century. Alix, daughter of Robert I, Count of Dreux, was the first to choose the Collegiate church of Saint Etienne for the burial of her family. At least, such was presumed - when a tomb was discovered (in 1815) - under the stone floor (subsequent to works ordered by the dowager, Duchess of Orleans, to renovate and build a new church). It has been suggested that the tomb encountered may have been that of the 2nd-husband of Alix, "Guy de Chatillon" (who died in 1168), or perhaps one of his six children, which she'd borne. That logical supposition is based-upon the discovery of, "un blason de gueules palé de vair au chef d'or" (a shield, comprised of a golden header, bearing red, vertical stripes, alternated by three, blue and white stripes of 'vair' - bells and pots, mirror-imaged) ...the very description of the armorial crest of the ), which was found inside a small copper box, within the aforementioned tomb. That same vessel contained a somewhat crude, second coat of arms (which it is thought) represents the armorial crest of, (a checker-board shield, of alternating gold and azure-blue squares). In any case, the Counts of Dreux continued to be entombed - sometimes at Braine, sometimes at Saint Etienne. The details of which, were left behind (inscribed on the tombstones) within the crypt of the Collegiate church of Saint Etienne. In the 1770s, Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon, Duke of Penthièvre (a grand-son of Louis IV and the Marquise of Montespan), was one of the wealthiest men of France, and largest land-owners, prior to the French Revolution. In 1775, the lands of the county of Dreux had been given to the Penthièvre by his cousin King Louis XVI. In 1783, the Duke sold his domain of Rambouillet to Louis XVI. On November 25 of that year, in a long religious procession, Penthièvre transferred the nine caskets containing the remains of his parents, Louis Alexandre, Count of Toulouse and Marie Victoire de Noailles, his wife, Princess Maria Teresa Felicitas of Modena, and six of their seven children, from the small medieval village church next to the castle in Rambouillet, to the "church of the Collegiate of Saint-Étienne", at Dreux. Penthièvre died in March 1793 and his body was laid to rest in the crypt beside his parents. On November 21 of that same year, in the midst of the French Revolution, a mob desecrated the crypt and threw the ten bodies into a mass grave in the "Chanoines Cemetery" of the "Collégiale Saint Étienne". In 1816 - the daughter of the Duke of Penthièvre, the "Duchess of Orléans", had a new (thrid church) built on the site of the mass grave of the Chanoines Cemetery - as the final resting place for her family. That 19th-century structure, the royal chapel of, "Saint Louis" at Dreux, was built atop the foundations of the two previous churches and the ancient cemetery, on the grounds of the Collegiate of St. Etienne (defunct - no longer exists). In 1830, Louis Philippe I, "King of the French", son of the Duchess of Orléans, embellished and enlarged that third edifice, which was renamed, as the Royal Chapel of Dreux ("Chapelle Royale de Dreux"), now the necropolis of the royal family of Orleans. Many of the most ancient Counts & Countesses of Dreux (and other nobles) were entombed within the "Collégiale de Saint Etienne", across six and one-half centuries. The under-ground crypt of the "Penthièvre" lineage connects to the more ancient crypt of the former "church of the Collegiate of Saint-Etienne". While the ruins of the collegiate church were sold and removed (between 1798 and 1815), the crypt remains. There is NO public access.