2. Marais – Enceinte

Borgarrölt
Enceinte, gamli borgarmúrinn & Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis

Enceinte, gamli borgarmúrinn, til vinstri & Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis til hægri

Enceinte

We leave the place in front of the palace by Rue de l’Ave Marie and then turn left on Rue des Jardins Saint-Paul. There we see the remains of Enceinte behind a small soccer field.

These are the remains of the city wall that king Philippe Auguste built in 1180-1220. He was one of the greatest kings of the Capetian line which reigned in the 11th to the 13th C. These were times of progress in Paris. Notre-Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, the Louvre and the city wall were built and Sorbonne and other university colleges were founded.

This was the first wall built around the city after it had spread to the banks around the islands. The Louvre started as a river castle, built as a part of this wall. If this wall is counted as wall no. 2 in the history of the city, next after the island wall, the walls in the end attained the number of six, in line with the gradual increase of the city size.

Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis

We look at the church in front of us.

The second oldest Paris church in the Jesuit Counter-Reformation style, built in 1627-1641. From here we can see the dome, which was typical of this style in church architecture in the 17th C. The style stood midway between the Mannerist and Baroque styles of those times. The strict design of the church is clear from this direction.

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