Ever since Michel Vovelle’s study of Provence, wills have been linked with secularisation. While several studies have shown how (chronologically and socially) religious practices decreased, the precise significance of wills in a religious context is also an important issue. It is a question that can only be answered by a global analysis of the status of wills in combination with other documents (like probate inventories) and changes in religious practice. In this respect eighteenth-century Orleans is a useful case study; the turning point in testamentary practices is situated in the 1740s and craftsmen lead the way. While testamentary demands decrease and wills grow more silent, especially concerning funeral arrangements, probate inventories show that such practices are still current. Above all, they become more individualised in the wills themselves. Thus a will does not have the same meaning in 1780 as in 1700. This suggests that wills reveal more a process of individualisation than of secularisation.