L’Histoire de Paris, de Lutèce à nos jours. / The History of Paris from Lutetia to the Present

In this course we shall study the main stages in the development of Paris, from the Gallo-Roman city of Lutetia to our days. The resources used will be: archeological finds, engravings, city maps, paintings and photographs (19th C.). Methodology will be based on urban sociology, history of urban development, history and art history.

The first part will be devoted to Lutetia, the Gallo-Roman city (52-253AD) and we shall study the archeological finds, the temples, the baths and the theaters. We shall also stress the importance of the progress of Christianity after the Edict of Milan by Emperor Constantine.

The next part will be about Paris in the Middle-Ages: the problem of the fortifications, Philippe-Auguste, Charles V, the king’s Palace, the Ile de la Cité and the Notre-Dame cathedral. In the third part we shall deal with the introduction of Italian architectural models in the 16th C. and their adaptation to the situation in Paris, and with royal urban development in the 17th C. We shall then concentrate on the history of the Louvre, from the original Castle in 1210 to the Greater Louvre by Pei in 1997. The following part will take us to a fundamental shift in the development of Paris: the urban restructuring imposed by Napoleon III and carried out by the Seine prefect Haussmann (1853-1870). The World Fairs will be studied, specifically that of 1889 with the Eiffel tower. The final chapter will be about the Orsay railway station (1900) and its transformation into a museum in 1986. The Défense business quarter will be the final object of our study.

Text: Students will have at their disposal a 70-page document including a list of all the slides used and the introductions for each part as well as a bibliography.