SultanAhmet Meydanı torgið séð frá Ægisif að Bláu mosku

SultanAhmet Meydanı

Miðjan í Istanbul er torgið SultanAhmet Meydanı, kennt við Ahmet I soldán, á nesinu milli Marmarahafs, Sæviðarsunds og Gullna hornsins. Þar var gamla borgin og þar gnæfir enn eitt af undrum veraldar, Ægisif, Hagia Sofia á grísku og Aya Sofia á tyrknesku, musteri heilagrar vizku, en ekki neinnar Soffíu, 1.500 ára gamalt listaverk og verkfræðiafrek.

Frá þessu víðáttumikla og gróðursæla torgi er stutt að rölta til flestra merkra minja í borginni. Þar er Bláa moskan, Topkapi-höllin, þjóðminjasafnið, súlna-vatnsbólið, Roxelana böðin og Hippodrome paðreimurinn. Í næsta nágrenni er Kapalı Çarşı markaðurinn og Süleymaniye moskan. Aðeins lengra er til borgarmúra Þeódósíusar keisara.

Næstu skref

Place du Tertre

Place du Tertre & Sacre-Coeur

Just in front of Saint-Pierre is the Place du Tertre.

A lively place where scores of painters are working and selling, and hundreds of tourists are lingering in pavement cafés.

Some narrow and village-like streets are near the square. Along Rue de Saules there is a short distance to the only vineyard in Paris and an historical joint, Lapin Agile. This is in fact a 400 years old village, gradually surrounded by Paris. Cars are of little use on the Butte and pedestrians are kings.

A good walk down from Montmartre is from the southern end of Rue de Saules to the metro station at Place des Abesses. The entrance there is in the Art Noveau style of the first years of the 20th C.

Now we take a trip to Versailles.

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Saint-Séverin

Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre

We turn right into Boulevard Saint-Germain, go past some good restaurants, suitable for lunch, including Dodin-Bouffant at Place Maubert, where we turn right on Rue Maitre Albert to the river bank and turn left. Immediately we leave the bank by Rue des Grands Degrés and continue along Rue de la Bücherie to Square Réne-Viviane and see Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre behind the garden.

The oldest unspoiled church in Paris, built 1170-1220 in Early Gothic, with no transepts. Unfortunately it has been converted into a Greek-Orthodox church, making it impossible for laymen to the fairest part, the chancel.

Saint-Séverin

Behind Saint-Julien we see another church, Saint-Séverin.

One of the most beautiful examples of Late Flamboyant Gothic in Paris. The building was started in the first half of the 13th C. and not finished until 1530. The church is peculiar in being short and wide. It has two ambulatories instead of the usual one. Therefore, its interior is like a forest of columns.

Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre

Outside the church there is a garden with shady trees and arcades, a good resting place before the final spurt of this walk.

Rue de la Huchette

From the back of Saint-Séverin we walk north along Rue Saint-Jacques and then turn left into Rue de la Huchette.

A lively pedestrian street, filling up with Greek and Middle-Eastern eateries. Some narrow streets lead off the street. These are the ancient alleys of the oldest part of the Left bank.

We finally end this walk at the other side of Rue de la Huchette where it meets Place Saint-Michel, the entrance to the Left bank. Many pavement cafés are there to invigorate the limbs.

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Place Saint Michel

Saint-Michel

From the museum we take Rue Sommerard to the right to Boulevard Saint-Michael to the corner of Boulevard Saint-Germain.

The main crossroads of Left bank traffic. These two boulevards, Saint-Michel and Saint-Germain, are the main arteries of automotive and pedestrian traffic in this part of Paris. Most important or interesting things on the Left bank happen near these two streets. Both are lined with pavement cafés where students and travellers are lingering.

Saint-Michel, for a long time characterized by literary cafés, was the venue of student demonstrations against the Nazis in 1944 and against the government in 1968. Now it is characterized by cafés and restaurants and book stores. The alleys behind are full of nightclubs, avant-garde theatres, ethnic shops and specialized boutiques.

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Thermes de Cluny

We continue on Rue de la Sorbonne straight to Musée de Cluny.

This is a very special place as we have here in one location the remains of Roman baths and one of the oldest mansions in Paris, Hôtel Cluny.

The remains of the Roman baths are considered to be about one third of the original structure from the beginning of the 3rd C. Best preserved is the cold bath, frigidarium, an open hall, 21 meters to 11 meters and with a height of 14,5 meters. The hot bath, caldarium, and the tepid bath, tepidarium, have for the most part been destroyed.

Hotel Cluny

This and the Arènes de Lutèce, mentioned earlier on this walk, are the only remains from Roman times in Paris. In addition, Paris has the Roman fame of being the place where the garrison proclaimed Julianus Apostata as Roman emperor in 360.

Hôtel Cluny

We enter the museum in Hôtel de Cluny.

The abbey, partly built upon the ruins of the baths, is well known in the history of architecture. There are only two Gothic mansions left in Paris. One is Hôtel de Sens and this is the other. The Gothic style is evident in the exterior decoration of the abbey.

The abbey is now an art museum concentrating on antique tapestries.

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College de France

College de France

We turn right into Rue Valette and then left through Rue de Lanneau to Collège de France.

All buildings in this area are university buildings. In the 12th C. teachers and students evaded the power of the Ile de la Cité bishops and moved here. Many university colleges grew up here, the first in 1215.

The colleges or Universités in Paris now number 13 and have about 200,000 students. The buildings are spread over the city, but here their concentration is greatest. Learning gave the district its name, the Latin quarter, even if no Latin is spoken in its streets any more.

Sorbonne

We continue along Collège de France and come to the back of Sorbonne at Rue Saint-Jacques. We can make a detour around Sorbonne by turning left into that street, then right into Rue Cujas and finally to the right along Rue Cousin and Rue de la Sorbonne to the front of the Sorbonne.

The Sorbonne is the most famous of the Univeristés, founded 1253 as a college of theology. The first printing house in France started there in 1469. In 1968 the Sorbonne became one of the main centres of student unrest in France.

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Saint-Étienne-du-Mont

Saint-Étienne-du-Mont

We leave the arena and climb Rue des Arènes, cross Rue Monge and take the steps into Rue Rollin. With a short detour into Rue du Cardinal Lemoine to the right and then Rue Thouin to the left we arrive at the Rue Descartes to the right and then Rue Clovis to the right. This seems complicated but is in fact a very short distance. We are at Saint-Étienne-de-Mont.

Built 1492-1626, a strange mixture of styles. It is even bent in the plan, as we can see by taking a look at its irregular west front. It is mainly Gothic, but some elements are Renaissance. It is unique in Paris in having a big rood screen in front of the chancel. Such screens were in fashion in the 15th and 16th C., but have been removed in other Paris churches.

Pantheon is here next door, but we saw it on our last walk so we will skip it here.

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Arènes de Lutèce

From there we take Rue Lacépede and soon turn right into Rue de Navarre where we arrive at Arènes de Lutèce.

A relatively well-preserved arena from Roman times. Its age has not been established with certainty, but it could be from the 1st C. The Romans first came to Paris in 54 B.C. and had a permanent camp from the year 1 A.D. They called their settlement Lutetia, Lutèce in French. Christianity arrived here about 250. Barbarians sacked Paris in 280 and destroyed the arena.

Since then the structure was forgotten beneath the surface until it was accidentally found during road making in 1869. It has been excavated and now it is used by men playing pétoncle and boys playing soccer, while travellers rest in the audience stalls. Restaurant Baptiste is around the corner.

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Rue Fürstemberg

We go back Rue de Seine and turn left into Rue Jacob and again left into Rue de Fürstemberg.

A peaceful pedestrian street with a romantic tiny square with old-fashioned street-lamps. Often there is singing and playing of musical instruments under the mild shadows of the trees in the square.

From the square we retrace our steps and turn right into a quaintly curved street, Rue Cardinale, with some old houses. Then we turn left and continue a few steps along Rue de l’Abbaye and then to the right along Rue de l’Échaudée, all streets reserved for pedestrians. We have reached Boulevard Saint-Germain again.

We almost immediately leave it to the left into Rue de Buci which lies in an angle over Rue de Seine, crossing the market. We have a look into Rue Mazarine where art galleries abound, before we turn right into Rue de l’Ancienne Comédie. Pub Saint-Germain is there and the historical Café Procope.

Once again we are in Boulevard Saint-Germain. Once more we immediately leave it, through the pedestrian Passage-du-Commerce-Saint-André, where we can see remains of the old city wall behind windows at no. 4 and where we can rest at Cour de Rohan.

At the end of the passage we turn right into Rue Saint-André-des-Arts, which we follow all the way to the Seine, passing restaurant Allard. 

This walk is finished.

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Rue de Seine

Boulevard Saint-Germain

The center of Left bank pavement café-life is around the church. We have a look around.

The boulevard lies in a curve through the 5th, 6th and 7th districts, starting at the Seine opposite Ile de Saint-Louis and ending at the Seine opposite Place de la Concorde. This part is in the 6th district, and is the cultural centre of Paris, the neighbourhood of publishers and book shops, antiquarians and art galleries, cafés and restaurants.

In the last century Montmartre was the main artists’ centre. Before World War II Montparnasse was the centre. But since then Saint-Germain has taken over as the cultural navel. In that vanguard were Jean-Paul Sartre and other existentialists such as Albert Camus and Simone de Beauvoir. Their cafés, Flore and Deux Magots are nestling here under the church.

The district is full of narrow streets, nooks and crannies, difficult for cars but the more so pleasant for pedestrians. We shall stroll around without hurry and give us time to have a look into side streets.

We go north from the west front of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, cross the boulevard and go into Rue Bonaparte. We scan Rue Jacob with quaint shops and small hotels, continue on Rue Bonaparte and turn right into Rue des Beaux Arts, with the “Hotel” where Oscar Wilde was in 1900 “dying above my means”.

Rue de Seine

We turn right into Rue de Seine.

Near the corner of Rue des Beaux Arts and Rue de Seine there is the old café Tabac de l’Institut. Rue de Seine is also a street of art galleries, and it is located in a district with the greatest number of cafés and restaurants, including Muniche.

A food and flower market in the heart of the Left bank, in Rue de Seine, from Boulevard Rue de Buci to Saint-Germain and along Rue de Buci to the west along the latter street. This is a market vibrant with colours, especially convenient for visitors to the city.

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