Nancy

As promised, here is a bit of what I saw in Nancy, both the first time I went and last weekend.  The concert went fine, I'll discuss that a bit more later.

I spent only half a day in the town of Nancy, but it's fairly small and compact so I did get to see a lot of things.  Unfortunately I didn't get to go to the art nouveau museum, which I really wanted to see.  Maybe next time.

Unlike a lot of the places in France I've visited (notably Rouen, Reims, Orleans, and Amboise) most of Nancy's important history is not medieval.  In fact it was only really founded in 1050 - I say ONLY because most cities here are considerably older, although to Americans that seems ancient - and has been rebuilt a few times due to being involved in several wars.

This area of France has probably changed hands more times than the east, which went back and forth between the English and French for centuries.  Nancy is in Lorraine, a territory that since the 13th century has been in the hands of the following, chronologically: Champagne (an independent vassal state of France at the time); the Holy Roman Empire (what we would now consider a "German" empire); disputed with Burgundy (another independent vassal state of France); occupied by France proper; the Hapsburg [Austrian] Empire; France again; Prussia [German empire]; France; Nazi Germany; finally France again.

Whew.  Suffice to say, this area has been disputed for a very long time and lots of battles have been fought over it. Nancy remained the capital of the region throughout all that.

Not too much has remained from the early days of the city, I'm guessing because of all the wars and occupiers.  Just a few gates of the historic city walls remain, such as this one:

You might notice the cross of Lorraine in the middle there from my visit to Normandy, where it stands to commemorate the arrival of General de Gaulle after D-Day.  It was adopted as the symbol of the Resistance. 

Much of the city seems to date from the late 18th/early 19th centuries, when Lorraine was firmly in French hands.  Visually it reminds me most of Bordeaux (I was going to link to my old post on Bordeaux here but realized I didn't put any pictures up!  I will later). 

The centerpiece of the town is the main square, the Place Stanislas, which boasts of being one of the most beautiful squares in Europe.  It is very pretty, well laid-out, and grand, but I don't know if I'd agree with them.  It has these, called the "golden gates" at each of the entrances:

The square is very large, with the town hall at one end, a statue of the former king of Poland (and father to Marie Leszczynskaya, queen of Louis XV - see my entry of the palace of Versailles) who owned Nancy in the later 18th century, the aforementioned Stanislas.  At the opposite end from the town hall is a really beautiful fountain, and next to that a mini Arc de Triomphe.  It's all very balanced and 18th century.

When I visited there was a jazz orchestra playing in the middle of the square.  Pretty cool!

 Just a few blocks away is the main cathedral of the city, in a style I haven't posted on here since I went to Italy!  It has more of the Italian 17th century style, very much not the Gothic stuff I usually show.  It's large and the altars are pretty ornate but you can tell it doesn't have the best upkeep: the frescoes are very dark and dirty (note the fresco in the shot of the ceilings), and a lot of the pieces of artwork have been removed.

 

 

I'm told the choir I sang with has performed here recently.

This section of the city is clearly a record of its most prosperous times: the streets are wide and neatly organized, the buildings are all the typical tan stone townhouse styles that you can see all over Paris and Bordeaux.  It's easy to imagine rich bourgeois ladies sweeping through the avenues in their huge 18th century dresses.

On the other side of the square, however, is evidence of a more provincial and medieval lifestyle.  The roads get narrower, the buildings are a mix of architecture from medieval to modern, some streets are still cobblestone.  Personally I like these areas better, so I strolled along trying to get a feel for the different periods in the town's history.  I didn't know a lot specifically about the history of Nancy or what I wanted to do there so I was discovering a lot of things as I went along.

I came across this church from the back, and was surprised to see something that looked authentically Gothic (ie, medieval) and didn't seem to be advertised in the tourist stuff I'd picked up.

Coming around to the front you can see a huge difference in color of the stone: above it is pretty typical of Gothic churches, somewhat dirty and weather-beaten, a dull off white or tan; below it's clean and pristine, the color I generally see when casts have replaced original statues and details (like in my entry on the cathedral at Reims).

So I figured it had probably been cleaned recently, and also replaced sometime in the 20th century.  Imagine my surprise upon going inside and reading that this church is actually from the mid 19th centrury!  Oops.  I was pretty embarrassed, as someone who is an amateur of Gothic art and architecture, that I didn't recognize it as a late copy.  It's really authentic though, I've never seen one replicate Gothic styles this closely!

The stained glass is all clearly modern though.  Very beautiful, especially because I went just as the sun was shining through the western windows.

 Anyway, this church was kind of on the border between the 18th century part of the city and the part that comes from the next important period for Nancy: late 19th/early 20th century, when it was the center of the Art Nouveau movement.  Lots of the buildings and windows in this section have cool little art nouveau and art deco details.

Many of the artists who began the shift into modern art styles were at the school of fine arts in Nancy, and were influenced by both French and German traditions here.  They have a great art nouveau museum that I really want to see.

There is a really large, lovely, park from this period as well.  I was getting tired from all the walking and decided to take a break there.  

I knew it had a pretty famous rose garden area:

 

But I did not know that it also has a Rodin sculpture just hanging out in the middle!

It is of some historical guy who did something notable here - I want to say he was a duke or something who fought in one of the later medieval battles.  Anyway, he's not the important part, look at the base of the statue.

So those are the things I made a point to go see, but I spent most of the time just walking around the town.  I had missed the earlier train I intended to take so didn't have as much time as I wanted.  I'm going back at the end of June, though, so hopefully I can see more then. 

Here are a bunch of pictures from just walking around:

This street below leads to the Place Stanislas, and features the high end shopping area of the town, which is pretty impressive (even coming from someone who lives in Paris!):

A pretty little park:

From the more medieval area:

From the bourgeois 18th century area, here is a provincial example of the "palaces" rich people used to build in that period.  I discussed them more in my post on the 3rd arrondissement of Paris.

And as I walked back to the train station I spied this plaque bearing Thomas Jefferson's head.  It commemorates the time he was an ambassador to France immediately before the French Revolution, and talks a bit about the exchange of democratic ideas between the two countries in that period.  It doesn't mention Nancy in particular, though, so I have no clue why it was on that building.

Next post: a bit about the concert and the place we performed.