Paris - Urban growth since 1700
Turn of an Era
978-3-14-100890-6 | Page 93 | Ill. 1
Overview
Close to a passage across the Seine in the area of the Île de la Cité, the Celtic tribe of the Parisi founded a settlement which was given the name "Nautae Parisiaci" after the subjugation of Gaul by Julius Caesar (52 BC). The Gallo-Roman town was abandoned in the course of the migration of the peoples, but, under the Merovingians, urban development began again on the same site.
Around 1900
The social differentiation of the inner city intensified in the 19th century. The most serious changes, especially in the street network, took place in the inner city under Napoleon III. (reigned 1852-1870). Under his city prefect Baron Haussmann, not only was the great north-south axis between the East Station and Montparnasse laid out, but the west-east axis via the Rue de Rivoli to the Place de la Bastille and the inner boulevard rings were also created. Star-shaped street intersections became characteristic of the new Paris, with a prominent focal point at their centre. Exemplary of this is the Place Charles de Gaulle, formerly Place d "Étoile, with its central Arc de Triomphe.
The explosive population growth to 4.2 million inhabitants (in the course of industrialisation and through increased immigration of people from the provinces) was accompanied by a strong expansion of the settlement areas. The neighbourhoods to the west of the inner city remained reserved for the privileged upper classes. The east of Paris and the outskirts, on the other hand, became impoverished and developed into the "ceinture rouge", the "red belt" of working-class neighbourhoods, where the revolutionary uprisings of 1830 and 1848 and the Paris Commune of 1870 originated.
