Explore Nîmes: The Italian City in France! | History, Architecture, & Culture 

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The Roman monuments of Nimes are the best preserved in the Roman world, especially the amphitheatre built on the model of the Colosseum., whose construction began in 79 AD at the time of the inauguration of the Colosseum of Rome and was inaugurated in 122 at the games given by the Emperor Hadrian during his visit to Nimes. The preservation of the Nîmes amphitheatre is so exceptional that the municipality of Rome used some years ago the images of the Nîmes amphitheatre to promote the Italian capital instead of the dilapidated Roman coliseum, which caused scandal.The Gallic tribe that occupied the region of Nimes (Nemausus in Latin) being part of the faithful allies of Julius Caesar and his nephew Octavian future Emperor Augustus who provided troops in order to conquer the rest of Gaul and defeat his rival Pompey to the 1st then the second allowing him to defeat his rival Mark Antony and the Queen of Egypt Cleopatra.The current coat of arms of the city of Nîmes with the crocodile attached to a palm that symbolizes the defeat of Egypt against Rome comes from a coin published in Nîmes recalling this event. As a reward for his fidelity to the cause of his family, the Emperor Augustus who loved to stay in Nimes in his divine shrine located on the present gardens of the Fountain built on the ancient Roman site,fill the city with goodness by endowing it with the largest enclosure of Gaul whose remains can be seen with the great Roman tower (Tour Magne) at the top of the hill above the gardens of the Fountain from which one has a superb panorama of the city and its surroundings, but also the Gate of Italy known as the Gate of Augustus because the bronze statue of the emperor Augustus offered by Mussolini to the city in 1935 as well as the Gate of Spain known as the Gate of France is inscribed in it an inscription reminding that it was through this gate that his entrance was made King of France Louis XIV during his visit to the city in 1660 accompanied by his personal guard of the famous Musketeers, among whom was D"Artagnan immortalized by the novel of Alexandre Dumas. The Emperor Augustus endowed the city with an aqueduct whose visible part remains the spectacular bridge of the Gard that spans the river Gardon about twenty kilometers from Nimes as well as the water tower in Nimes (Castellum divisorum) which is the only monument of this type still existing with that of Pompeii, and which distributed the waters coming from the aqueduct in the pipes of the city .The city in return for the affection of the emperor Augustus built on the forum a temple dedicated to the grandsons of the emperor Augustus which is called Maison Carrée always visible and perfectly preserved. During the 2nd century Nîmes was the cradle of the Roman imperial clan since born in Nîmes Plotine was the wife of the emperor Trajan and contributed to the elevation to the throne of his successor Hadrien hence the latter’s visit to Nîmes in 122 ,which appointed as successor Antoninus son and grandson of senators and consuls born in Nîmes because Augustus had conferred on Nîmes the special status dispensating its inhabitants from paying a tribute to Rome and thus placing the city under the direct administration of Rome and not of the capital of the Narbonne Province, the inhabitants of Nimes considered as Romans sending senators seated in the Roman senate. Antonin, whose reign from 138 to 161 is considered to be that of the Pax Romana, also has as benefactor of the city of his ancestors his stone statue seen in the report.His daughter Fausta marries the emperor Marcus Aurelius and his grandson Commodus was the last emperor of the Antonine dynasty . Nimes had a famous gladiator school in the ancient world,gladiators whose funerary steles can be admired in the museum of the Romanity next to the arenas as as well as many other multiple Roman remains that are grouped there with as main piece the spectacular medallion of Cavaillargues retracing a fight between gladiators. At the death of the Empress Plotine, the Emperor Hadrian made him erect in Nimes a funeral mausoleum from which he will then be inspired to realize his own, the present Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome but this monument was destroyed in 737 by the Frankish chief Charles Martel like all the ancient monuments outside the Roman enclosure, of rage while he had tried to invade the region, not having succeeded in taking the fortress of Nîmes defended by the Visigoth Viscount of Nîmes and his Muslim allies, for little is known of this the amphitheatre of Nîmes was transformed into a fortress by the Visigoths in the 6th century and the rest for more than 700 years until 1391, undergoing numerous military sieges. The fortress of the arenas was the residence of the viscount of Nimes and his garrison called the Knights of the Arenas replaced in 1229 when Nimes was annexed to the kingdom of France by a royal garrison, so that all the kings of France who stayed at Nîmes from Saint Louis in 1248 came to supervise the construction of the port of Aigues Mortes in 1248 before embarking for the crusade in Egypt until Charles VI in 1389 who judged the castle too old, the building of another fortified castle was decided by the Royal Garrison, so that the fortress of the bullring was abandoned by the Royal Castle in 1391. The two arcades of the "amphitheatre plugged on the 2nd floor with openings facing the courthouse are the only vestiges of the military past of the "amphitheatre.

Hello, that sounds like a cool trip! I guess you will start in Lyon? You can do most of Geneva in a weekend but Barcelona is more of a 5 day trip in my opinion. I keep meeting people from the channel 🤣

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@@travelwithwill1The rich historical heritage of the city of Nîmes makes many historic places festive places (Thus during the feria on the weekend of Pentecost and the harvest in September several private mansions from the 16th to the 19th century are opened and transformed into bodegas, places where the participants of the ferias gather to dance, discuss and drink.) But there are also festive historical places in Nîmes outside the feria period The café Napoleon on boulevard Victor Hugo, rendez vous of the golden youth Nîmes founded in 1867 by a Corsican under the reign of Napoleon III with its ceiling rococo style classified where the bullfighting clubs of the city created the feria of Nîmes of pentecost as recalls a plaque. On the other hand, 20 rue Jean Reboul near the amphitheatre is the bar "Le Prolé" historical headquarters of the communists of Nîmes who ran the city from 1965 to 1983 where take place during the ferias and in the ferias of wild festivals. The place is located in the birthplace in 1884 of the writer, Jean Paulhan, director of the new French magazine and Éditions Gallimard, whose secretary Dominique Aury, in order to seduce him, wrote a sulphurous erotic novel "Histoire d'O".. There is also the hotel Imperator built in 1929 in the art deco style in which most of the bullfighters stars of bullfighting and most of the stars of the song stay, literature, paint, cinema and politicians visiting or in concert or filming in Nîmes.For example the general secretary of the USSR Khrushchev in 1960 or movie stars like Erol Flynn, Trevor Howard, Yves Montand, Simone Signoret ,Cocteau, Matisse, Coco Chanel.The gardens of the hotel Imperator hosted in 1959 the only meeting between two great personalities of the twentieth century the Spanish painter Picasso and the American writer Ernest Hemingway on the occasion of a fair where Picasso had come to support his friend the torero Luis Miguel Dominguin often accompanied by his Hollywood actresses like Ava Gardner then Lauren Bacall, while Hemingway accompanied to Nimes his friend the bullfighter Antonio Ordonez, two bullfighters whose rivalry in the arena inspired Hemingway his latest novel "The Dangerous Summer". The restaurant on the terrace of the media library built in 1993 by the architect Norman Foster opposite the Maison Carrée, in the"location of the old theatre in the city where the greatest artists of the theatre and the French song as Sarah Bernhardt destroyed in 1952 by an arson attack triggered by a singer to whom the director of the theatre had refused an engagement, offers a superb panorama of the city and overlooks the historic city center. The picturesque gypsy district of La Placette where Manitas de Plata stayed and some members of the Gypsys King resound guitar sounds and refers to Spain:La Placette in Nîmes is a village in the city. This neighborhood that has a long history is built around a mythical and emblematic place, a small square, without real name butdressed in a «soul», claimed by the inhabitants. Known to all Nîmes, the Placette seducesby its originality, its color, its small low houses, its popular and friendly side and themixing of the populations that live there, The houses Jullian and Bec de Lièvre by their colorful facades jump at the eyes of this republican district theater violent clashes sometimes murderous especially in the 19th century with the royalists especially during the municipal elections. The equally picturesque bars and restaurants of the rue Fresque, dark and narrow middle-aged alley, one of the oldest streets of Nîmes still very lively where you can admire some mansions, the house of the Advocate of the poor of the 15th century and a restaurant installed on the place of the old brothel of the city.Another restaurant allows to contemplate a bullfighting relic namely a chair of the restaurant borrowed by the team of the bullfighter Morante de la Puebla so that this-The broken bars of the chair bear witness to the impact of the horns on the object while the bullfighter dodged the burden of the bull with the

Thanks a lot! I really is worth visit