Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Place de l'Horloge
This café square was the town forum during Roman times and the market square through
the Middle Ages. (Restaurants here offer good people-watching, but they also have less am-
bience and low-quality meals—you'll find better squares elsewhere to hang your beret in.)
Named for a medieval clock tower mostly hidden behind City Hall (find plaque in English),
thissquare'spresentpopularityarrivedwiththetrainsin1854.Walkafewstepstothecenter
of the square, and look down the main drag, Rue de la République. When the trains came
to Avignon, proud city fathers wanted a direct, impressive way to link the new station to the
heart of the city (just like in Paris)—so they plowed over homes to create Rue de la Répub-
lique and widened Place de l'Horloge. This main drag's Parisian feel is intentional—it was
built not in the Provençal manner, but in the Haussmann style that is so dominant in Paris
(characterized by broad, straight boulevards lined with stately buildings).
• Walk uphill past the carousel (public WCs behind). Look up and follow the golden statue
ofMary,floatinghighabovethebuildings.Veerrightatthestreet'send,andcontinueinto...
Palace Square (Place du Palais)
This grand square is lined with the Palace of the Popes, the Petit Palais, and the cathedral.
In the 1300s, the entire headquarters of the Catholic Church was moved to Avignon. The
Church bought Avignon and gave it a complete makeover. Along with clearing out vast
spaces like this square and building this three-acre palace, the Church erected more than
three miles of protective wall (with 39 towers), “appropriate” housing for cardinals (read:
mansions), andresidences forits entire bureaucracy.The city wasEurope'slargest construc-
tion zone. Avignon's population grew from 6,000 to 25,000 in short order. (Today, 13,000
people live within the walls.) The limits of pre-papal Avignon are outlined on city maps:
Rues Joseph Vernet, Henri Fabre, des Lices, and Philonarde all follow the route of the city's
earlier defensive wall.
The Petit Palais (Little Palace) seals the uphill end of the square and was built for a car-
dinal; today it houses medieval paintings (museum described later). The church just to the
left of the Palace of the Popes is Avignon's cathedral. It predates the Church's purchase of
Avignon by 200 years. Its small size reflects Avignon's modest, pre-papal population. The
gilded Mary was added in 1854, when the Vatican established the doctrine of her Immacu-
late Conception. Mary is taller than the Palace of the Popes by design: The Vatican never
accepted what it called the “Babylonian Captivity” and had a bad attitude about Avignon
long after the pope was definitively back in Rome. There hasn't been a French pope since
the Holy See returned to Rome—over 600 years ago. That's what I call a grudge.
Directly across the square from the palace's main entry stands a cardinal's residence,
built in 1619 (now the Conservatoire National de Musique). Its fancy Baroque facade was
