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Setting:
Paris occupies a natural limestone basin hollowed out by the Seine,
which passes through the city en route to the Normandy coast about 150 km
to the northwest. The conventional names of the Right and Left Banks of the
Seine, used since ancient times, are oriented to face downstream (northwest).
The surrounding heights of the Paris basin define the limits of the modern
city, which extends 10 km in all directions from the center at the Île
de la Cité. The ancient and medieval city was much smaller, measuring
only about 2 km from end to end (fig.1).
While today the river level is some 9 m below
street level, the ground surface was significantly lower in antiquity and
the early Middle Ages, as attested to by the  underground archaeological crypt
found below Notre-Dame Cathedral. Much of the low-lying
area east of the city was a swampy zone known as the Marais (built over in
the 13th century, and today an upscale region of Paris), which was criss-crossed
by small Seine tributary
streams.
During Roman times the city was called Lutetia, derived from an ancient
Parisii word for marsh or swamp. Fig.1: Section of a map of Roman Paris (after Crypte
Archéologique 2005, Paris; MacKendrick 1972).
Ancient settlement
in Paris: Late Iron Age towns were abundant along the Seine
from the 3rd to 1st century BC, when the ancient Parisii (one of dozens of
Celtic tribes in Gaul) inhabited the area around the Île de la Cité.
At the time of the arrival of the Romans in 53-52 BC, the largest settlement
of the Parisii seems to have been at Nanterre (15 km west of the Île
de la Cité), where remains of a nucleated town have recently been
discovered within a loop of the Seine, including several main streets and
traces of hundreds of houses (see AR 4,1). Like many other
prosperous Celtic groups from Late Iron Age Gaul, Britain, and Germany, the
Parisii minted their own coins of bronze, silver, and gold, indicating their
involvement in trade networks fed by Roman commerce in wine and other
commodities.
Julius Caesar's account of the Gallic
Wars, de Bello Gallico (ca. 50 BC), the earliest written source on
the region, first mentions Lutetia as the scene where, in 53 BC, an
annual assembly was held between Caesar, commander of the Roman Legions,
and local Gallic leaders. In 52 BC, the Parisii broke their agreement with
the Romans in order to support the Gallic war leader Vercingetorix. Their
stronghold at Lutetia, left to be defended by the elderly warleader
Camulogenus, was captured and burned by Labienus, one of Caesar's generals.
The Romans soon established a new town
called Lutetia on the hills of the Left Bank of the Seine, with the
forum located about 1 km south of the river (fig.1). Roman Lutetia was laid
out at the intersection of the Seine and two parallel Roman roads running
north-south. The right hand or easternmost of these (today's rue St-Jacques)
served as the Roman cardo or main NS street. Ultimately coming from Spain,
this road passed through Orléans (Cenabum) to Paris, crossed
the Seine at the Île de la Cité via the Petit Pont ("small bridge")
and Grand Pont ("large bridge," now the Pont Notre-Dame) and went north through
Senlis. The second road (the present-day rue Galande), coming from Italy,
passed through Lyon to Paris, then turned NW toward Beauvais, Rouen, and
the Normandy coast. Linked by a grid of east-west streets, this network of
Roman roads remained at the core of Paris through the Middle Ages (Didier
Busson, 2003).
The Romanization of Paris was seemingly
well underway by the early 1st century AD. Evidence for this comes from
Le Pilier des Nautes, an altar to Jupiter found under the
choir of Notre-Dame cathedral. Erected by a corporation of local river
merchants
and sailors (nautes), it invokes several Roman deities along with
native Gallic gods. Other temples and shrines from the Gallo-Roman period
include a temple of Mercury on top of Montmartre, about 2 km north of the
Seine. Mercury was a popular god in Gaul, often joined or syncretized with
Gallic deities. A temple to the Egyptian goddess Isis, worshiped by many
Romans including the Emperor Hadrian (AD 116-133), also lay in the Left Bank
suburb of Locutitius, at the future site of St-Germain-des Prés.
The Roman forum measured 160 by 100 m,
with a layout similar to those found in many Roman towns at the time of Trajan
(AD 98-117). The interior open space of the forum was surrounded by shops
in a rectangular portico, with a basilica (law court) at the east end, and
a temple on the west end, thought to be dedicated to the official imperial
gods Romae and Augustus. A permanent army or legionary camp existed nearby.
Here, in AD 360, the troops proclaimed Julian II (fig.3) as their emperor.
Soon thereafter, the Emperor Valentinian I (AD 370-375) is also recorded
as staying in the camp (MacKendrick 1972).
By far the most conspicuous Roman ruins
in Paris are the baths (thermae) of Cluny (fig.2), named after the
16th century Hôtel de Cluny built around them.
Rediscovered
in the 12th century, the Cluny Baths retain large sections of the
frigidarium or cold rooms showing massive walls and vaulted openings,
which provided a direct model for medieval a rchitects building cathedrals,
bridges, and other large structures in the Romanesque style. The Cluny baths
were fed by a subterranean aqueduct with a source 16 km to the south at Rungus,
with an estimated capacity of 2,000 m3 per day (MacKendrick 1972). In 1903-04,
a second and third set of Roman baths came to light in Paris, one lying just
south of the forum and another found in the College de France, possibly part
of a palace or luxurious private home.
Fig.2: The 2nd-3rd c. AD bath ruins at the Hôtel
de Cluny show typical Roman construction of alternating stone and brick bonding layers (photo:Athena
Review).
The Roman town of Lutetia also
had an open-air amphitheater on the Left Bank that could hold 8,000-9,000
spectators, as well as a smaller covered theater for an audience of up to
4,500, and a chariot racing circuit or circus. Town administration buildings
were located on the Île de la Cité as well as in the forum.
By the late 3rd century, when Germanic invasions forced defensive reorganization
of Lutetia, a praesidium or headquarters was in the northern
end of the Île, to be used by Julian II in AD 357-360. This underlay
the medieval Royal Palace, and now holds the Palais de Justice.
A Roman necropolis existed at the southern
periphery of Lutetia along the main Roman north-south road coming
from Orléans, and Roman and Merovingian tombs lay along roads leading
out of the city. Another necropolis with Gallo-Roman and Merovingian tombs
was near the Petit Pont around the Churches of St-Julien-le-Pauvre and St.
Séverin. Both churches were built on tombs of Roman-era martyrs, part
of a continuity between Late Roman and early medieval religion and burial
customs.
The Franks
Julian II and The Salian
Franks: Germanic invasions
by the Franks and Alemanni in the late 3rd century AD destroyed much of the
Left Bank portions of the Gallo-Roman city of Lutetia, forcing its contraction
into a defensive stronghold on the Île de la Cité, utilizing
the Seine for protection. Walls were built along the island perimeter from
large stones taken from damaged Left Bank structures.
In AD 357-8, Julian II (fig.3),
then serving as consul and general commanding Gallic Legions, moved the Roman
capital of Gaul from Trier to Paris, which he defended against Germanic invaders
coming from the north, down the road from Senlis. Prior to being proclaimed
emperor by his troops in 360, Julian II (also known as Julian the Apostate
since he rejected Christianity as the official Roman religion) defeated the
Franks in a major battle at Strasbourg in AD 357. Julian then fatefully allowed
the Salian Franks to settle the west bank of the Rhine, in exchange for their
military services. Between AD 380 and 400
the Franks
provided an effective barrier against the invading Visigoths (pushed across
the Danube by the expansion of the Huns), and again in AD 406, against the
Vandals, Suebi, and Alani who crossed the Rhine, but were diverted southward
through Aquitaine and into Spain.
In AD 451 the Huns, a huge army of Asiatic
nomads, invaded Gaul under their warleader Attila in search of additional
subjects for the extortion of tribute  money, a livelihood they had perfected
in the Danube region during the previous half century. Just as they seemed
about to sack Paris, the Huns altered their course to the south, only to
be defeated near Orléans by Aetius, the last effective general of
the Roman Imperial armies. A young Christian girl named Geneviève,
who had preached to the alarmed Parisians that God would intervene on the
city's behalf, later became the patron saint of Paris.
Fig.3: Coin of Julian II (the Apostate) as
Roman emperor, minted in Paris in AD 360-363 (photo:Athena
Review).
Due to ongoing rivalries between Byzantine
and Roman leadership, Aetius was assassinated in AD 453 by the eastern Emperor
Valentinian III. Thus Roman control of northern France effectively ended,
although the local general Siagrius nominally upheld Roman rule from Soissons
in the Picardie region of northern France, even after the defection of the
last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustulus, in 476. In AD 486 Siagrius was finally
defeated in battle by Clovis, King of the Salian Franks. Using the political
vacuum in Gaul to his advantage, Clovis took over the remnants of the Roman
army and administrative structure, thus commencing the Frankish or Merovingian period in France.
References:
Busson, Didier. 2003. Paris, a Roman city. (tr. A. Keens).
Paris, Éditions du Patrimoine.
Caesar, Julius 58-50 BC. The Conquest of Gaul (tr. S.A. Handford,
1951, revised in 192 by J.F. Gardner). New York, Viking Penguin Inc.
Cole, R. 2003. A Traveller's History of Paris. 3rd edition.
Northhampton, MA, Interlink Books.
Gregory of Tours (orig. 6c AD). History of the Franks. (tr.
E. Brehaut Ph.D, 1916). New York, Columbia University Press.
Mackendrick, P. 1972. Roman France. New York, St. Martin's
Press.
This article appears on pages 22-26 of Vol.4 No.2 of Athena
Review.
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