Paris

View from the Montparnasse Tower (Tour Montparnasse) towards the Eiffel Tower. On the right Napoleon's tomb lies under the golden dome at Les Invalides. The towers of the office and entertainment centre La Defense line the horizon.
Larger version.

Paris was occupied by a Gallic tribe until the Romans arrived in 52 BC. The invaders referred to the previous occupants the Parisii[?], but called their new city Lutetia, meaning "marshy place". About fifty years later the city had spread to the left bank of the Seine, now known as the Latin Quarter, and had been renamed "Paris".

Roman rule was over by 508, when Clovis the Frank made the city the capital of the Merovingian dynasty of the Franks. Viking invasions during the 800s forced the Parisians to build a fortress on the Ile de la Cité. During one invasion Paris was sacked by Viking raiders, probably under Ragnar Lodbrok, who collected a huge ransom in exchange for leaving on March 27, 845. The first French king, Odo, was chosen in this period.

During the 11th century the city spread to the Right Bank. The 12th and 13th centuries, which included the reign of Philip II Augustus (1180-1223), are especially notable for the growth of the city. Main thoroughfares were paved, the first Louvre was built as a fortress, and several churches, including the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, were constructed or begun. Several schools on the Left Bank were organized into the Sorbonne, which counts Albertus Magnus and St. Thomas Aquinas among its early scholars. In the Middle Ages Paris prospered as a trading and intellectual centre, interrupted temporarily when the Black Death struck in the 14th century. Under the reign of King Louis XIV, the Sun King, from 1643 to 1715, the royal residence was moved from Paris to nearby Versailles.

The French Revolution began with the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789. Many of the conflicts in the next few years were between Paris and the outlying rural areas of France.

View over Paris and the Seine from the roof top café on La Samaritaine[?] department store. Larger version

In 1870 the Franco-Prussian War ended in a siege of Paris and the Paris Commune, which surrendered in 1871 after a hard winter. The Eiffel Tower, the best-known landmark in Paris, was built in 1889 in a period of prosperity known as La Belle Époque[?].

Administration

The city of Paris is itself a département of France (Paris, 75), and subdivided into twenty numerically organised districts, the arrondissements. These districts are numbered in a spiral pattern with the 1er arrondissement[?] at the center of the city.

Prior to 1964, département 75 was "Seine", which contained the city and the surrounding suburbs. The change in boundaries resulted in the creation of 3 new départements forming a ring around Paris, often called la petite couronne (the little crown): Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne.

Bertrand Delanoë is Paris Mayor since March 18, 2001.

Former mayors: Jacques Chirac, Jean Tiberi[?]

Geography

The altitude of Paris varies quite considerably with several prominent hills :

• Montmartre - 130 metres (425 feet) above sea level
• Belleville - 115 metres (375 feet) above sea level
• Menilmontant[?]
• Chaumont[?]
• Passy[?]
• Chaillot[?]
• Montagne Ste-Genevieve[?]
• Butte-aux-Cailles[?]
• Montparnasse (the hill there was levelled in the 18th century)

Transport

Paris is served by two principal airports: Orly Airport, which is south of Paris, and the international airport Charles De Gaulle International Airport in Roissy, France[?].

Paris is densely covered by an underground railway system, the Métro. This interconnects with a high-speed regional network, the RER, and also the train network: commuter lines, national train lines, and the TGV.

The city is the hub of France's motorway network, and is surrounded by a large orbital road, the Peripherique.

Places in Paris

Notable places in Paris:

Monuments and buildings

• The Eiffel Tower
• Arc de Triomphe - war monument at the center of the Place de l'Etoile.
• Les Invalides - tomb of the soldiers, including Napoleon
• The Conciergerie -- ancient castle/prison.
• Palais Garnier -- home of the Paris Opera.
• Cathedral of Notre Dame on the Ile de la Cité
• The Samaritaine[?] Building - department store from the start of the 20th century
• The Sorbonne -- famous university
• Statue of Liberty - A smaller version of the New York City harbor statue which France gave to the United States in 1886.
• The Pantheon of Paris - tomb for France's greatest heroes.
• Sainte-Chapelle - 13th-century Gothic palace chapel.
• Église de la Madeleine

Museums

• The Louvre - a huge museum housing many works of art, including the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo statue.
• The Musée du Montparnasse[?] in the former residence of artist Marie Vassilieff at 21 Avenue du Maine, details the history of the great artistic community of Montparnasse.
• The Musee d'Orsay - an art museum housed in a converted 19th century railway station, containly mainly Impressionist works.
• Centre Georges Pompidou - houses the museum of modern art.
• The Musee Rodin - a large collection of work's by France's most famous sculptor

Suburbs, streets and other areas

• Montmartre -- historic area on the Butte, home to the Basilica of Sacré Coeur[?] and also famous for the studios and cafés of many great artists.
• Champs-Élysées - the most famous street in the world, a broad boulevard.
• Rue de Rivoli - elegant boutiques for the rich
• Place de la Concorde - at the foot of the Champs-Élysées, formerly Place de la Revolution, site of the infamous guillotine.
• Place de la Bastille, where the Bastille castle/prison stood until the Revolution.
• Montparnasse - historic area on the Left Bank, famous for the studios, music-halls, and cafés of the world's greatest artists who converged on Paris.
• Pere Lachaise Cemetery - one of the most popular tourist sites in Paris, it contains the graves of many famous French men and women and those from other countries who came to live in France.
• Cimetière de Montmartre
• Cimetiere de Montparnasse
• Cimetière de Passy
• Les Halles - shopping precinct, includes an important underground connection station.

Night life

• Le Lido[?] - Cabaret on the Champs-Élysées famous for its exotic shows and where, as an American GI on leave with some army friends, Elvis Presley gave an impromptu concert.
• Bal du Moulin Rouge, Le Crazy Horse Saloon[?], the Paris Olympia, Les Folies Bergere[?] - Famous nightclubs

In the greater Paris region

• Disneyland Resort Paris - amusement park to the east of the city
• La Défense - major office, theater and shopping complex and site of the Grande Arche.
• Palace of Versailles - the former royal palace, in the town of Versailles to the southeast of Paris. The No.1 tourist attraction in France.
• Saint Denis Basilica - ancient Gothic Cathedral and burial site for many French monarchs located north of the city.

Events

• 1848 - Paris Commune
• 1855 - Exposition Universelle (1855)

• 1867 - Exposition Universelle (1867)[?]
• 1878 - Exposition Universelle (1878)[?]
• 1889 - Exposition Universelle (1889)[?] - Eiffel Tower
• 1900 - Exposition Universelle (1900)[?]
• 1925 - Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes (1925)[?]
• 1931 - French Colonial Exposition (1931)[?]
• 1968 - student riots in Paris, combined with a series of strikes by workers across the country, threaten briefly to bring down the Gaullist[?] government

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For alternate uses of "Paris" see Paris (disambiguation)