In the Middle Ages, Lyon was one of the most important exhibition centers in Europe. Buildings and parts of the city from different eras still shape the cityscape today. B. the gothic cathedral Saint-Jean. The oldest church is Saint-Martin d’Ainay from the 12th century.
Historic Sites in Lyon: Facts
| Official title: | Historic sites in Lyon |
| Cultural monument: | Old town, the Renaissance quarter with 300 houses in the style of the late Gothic to the Italian Renaissance and the Rue Saint-Jean as the main street – there, among others. the Hôtel du Chamerrier, the Tour Rosse, the Hôtel de Gadagne and Maison Henri IV. – as well as the Saint-Jean Cathedral, as well as the Fourvière district with the Odeon and the Notre-Dame Basilica, the La Presqu’île district and the Pentes district de la Croix-Rousse, a former silk weaving district |
| Continent: | Europe |
| Country: | France, Région Rhône-Alpes |
| Location: | Lyon, at the confluence of the Saône and Rhône, south of Dijon |
| Appointment: | 1998 |
| Meaning: | Evidence of an urban settlement of more than two millennia in a place of great strategic and commercial importance |
Historic Sites in Lyon: History
| 43 BC Chr. | Foundation of the ancient city |
| 177 | Persecution of Christians in Lyon |
| 197 | Battle of Lyon between the troops of Septimius Severus and Albinus |
| 383 | Gratian’s murder by his own soldiers |
| 1244 | Escape of Pope Innocent IV (1243-54) from Rome to Lyon |
| 1245 | At the first Lyon Council, Emperor Frederick II was deposed by the Pope |
| 1464 | Lyon becomes a trade fair city |
| 1494 | under Charles III. Expulsion of the Florentine Bank from Lyon |
| 1536 | Construction of the Hôtel Bullioud |
| 1805 | In Lyon, invention of the jacquard loom (jacquard machine) |
| 1831 and 1834 | Uprisings of the silk weavers |
Renaissance and Resistance
“Lyon was a beautiful, lively, lively city, it looked back on a bloody history and was always diligent and always a place of revolts, a focus of unrest,” wrote the novelist Wolfgang Koeppen on one more than five decades ago Travel through France. During his visit, Koeppen was particularly impressed by the cityscape and the river banks. Here the lazy Saône, coming from the Vosges, and the Rhône, a sometimes unruly Alpine daughter, flow together. “Father Rhône” and “Mama Saône” enclose an elongated alluvial peninsula on which the heart of the city has been beating for centuries.
Founded by the Romans, Lugdunum rose to become the capital of the province of Gallia Lugdunensis within a few years. With its expansion, ancient Lyon was larger than Paris, Cologne or Verona at the time. Despite its great Gallo-Roman past, the city had to lag behind Paris in the Middle Ages. It was not until the 15th century that an enormous economic boom set in, supported by the French king. With four annual fairs and the textile industry with silk processing at the top, the city experienced a heyday that was also reflected in the architecture. Italian bankers founded a stock exchange and introduced the Renaissance style in Lyon.
In the 16th century, Lyon also experienced an extremely glamorous age. According to mathgeneral, France’s first literary salon was founded, and the monk and humanist François Rabelais, who practiced as a doctor at the city’s Hôtel Dieu in 1532, published his contemporary satirical cycle of novels about the giants “Gargantua and Pantagruel”.
The Vieux Lyon on the right bank of the Saône is one of the most impressive architectural examples of that era and is considered to be the greatest Renaissance quarter in France. This ensemble also includes late Gothic and classicist buildings, including the Cathédrale Saint-Jean with its filigree rose window, but the most fascinating are the Renaissance buildings with their finely crafted loggias and spiral staircases. The Notre-Dame-de-Fourvière basilica rises high above the Saône and Vieux Lyon, and is praised as the “twin sister” of Sacré-Coeur. From the tower of this pilgrimage church, the view extends as far as Mont Blanc on a clear day.
A road tunnel leads from the Fourvière district over to Pentes de la Croix Rousse, Lyons ‘historic weavers’ quarter. Once upon a time, more than 60,000 weavers lived and worked in the neighborhood, criss-crossed by narrow traboules, in houses packed close together, the characteristic feature of which was the high ceilings to make room for the jacquard looms. The »Traboules«, which are characteristic of the quarter, denote a tangle of corridors and stairs that connect house with house, backyard with backyard and alley with alley, so that the weavers were able to transport their valuable products without being exposed to the rigors of the weather to be. During the weavers’ unrest in the 1830s and in World War II, these served as escape routes. During the dark years of the German occupation of France, the fighters of the French resistance escaped their pursuers through the confusing network of roads. However, one of the leaders of the resistance, Jean Moulin, did not escape his captors. He was arrested in 1943 in Weberstadt and tortured to death by the Gestapo.
Enclosed by the Rhône and the Saône, Lyon presents itself from its most representative side in the La Presqu’île district. The optical fixed point in the north of the peninsula is the town hall on the Place des Terreaux with the huge Fontaine de Bartoldi; the figures of the fountain symbolize the rivers heading towards the sea. The district’s wide shopping streets are lined with magnificent town houses and lead to Place Bellecour, one of the largest and most beautiful squares in France for those who know France.
