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Places of interest on the outskirts of Besançon Historical and Architectural sites / Museums / Natural sites Anyone could spend hours walking around the streets of the beautiful town centre of Besançon, but there are many intersting sites around the city that owe to be visited. Besides, going to those sites will let you go through Franche-Comté's beautiful landscape, from the plains of the Saone River, to the forests and mountains of the Jura, with it's lakes, point of views and natural reserves (small video). Special thanks to the French Society for Microtechnics and Chronometry for the content of this page Historical and Architectural Sites Citadelle de Besançon Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans Ville d'Ornans Château de Belvoir Porte Noire et Square Castan Théatre Romain de Mandeure Château de Joux Beaux-Arts et Archéologie Histoire Naturelle The museum of Natural History is hosted by the
Citadel. It includes a large Zoo, an aquarium, an insectarium, and
many collections. It's Paleontology room prime attraction is a rare
prehistoric fossile fish, a Coelacanth. A well furnished butterflies
collection, local wildlife animals as well as exotic ones, combine
to make of this museum a very attractive place to visit. Résistance et Déportation Maisons Comtoises de Nancray Musée Peugeot Peugeot, one of France's largest vehicle manufacturer,
now has its own museum for automobiles, but also for all kinds of
products the enterprise has manufactured in its past (bicycles,
firearms, sewing machines...). Racing cars and protoypes are also
on exhibit, totalising near 100 models of automobiles from various
periods. Musée-Fromagerie de Trepot The old cheese-dairy co-operative of Trepot in
activity from 1818 to 1977 has evolved into a local museum for cheese
and all the activities related to it. The visit includes an explanation
of the processing stages of the Comté cheese, the region's
reknowned speciality. Musée du Temps Grotte d'Osselle Discovered during the Middle-Ages (used at that
time for refuge) and explorated for centuries afterwards, the Osselle
karst Caves are considered one of the most fascinating natural sites
in Europe. Coloured caves of various shapes, "forests"
of stalagmites and stalagtites, an underground river, offer the
visitor a wonderful show for the eyes and the mind in an unsuspected
atmosphere. Vignoble Jurassien With the first french wine A.O.C. (wines of verified
origin and quality), the vineyards of Jura are still mostly unknown,
even in France. Dating back to the Roman period and the Middle-Ages,
local wines used to be reknowned at the courts of France and the
Empire. Although it was weakened by the two world wars and the Phylloxera,
Jura still produces wines of high quality in small quantities (like
the famous "Vin Jaune" or Yellow Wine) with very few exports,
so that locals can keep them for themselves...;) Gouffre de Poudrey Discovered in 1899, the Poudrey Chasm is one of
the most impressive natural attractions of the region. It is more
than 100 meters deep and has one of the biggest subterranean halls
in Europe (600 meters of circumference and 60 meters in height).
You will discover there beautiful limestone formations (enormous
stalagmites, etc...) and a small underground lake, formed by moisture
water. The music that will accompany you (mostly Wagner and Jean-Michel
Jarre) will add to the mistery of this site.
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The
Citadel of Besançon dates back to the Celtic era. In his
De Bello Gallicum, Julius Caesar already said about the fortress
of Vesontio (celtic name of Besançon) that it was one of
the best defensive sites he had ever seen. Under Louis XIV, Vauban
turned it into a stronghold consisting of three successive lines
of defensive walls, on top of the rocky promentory that closes the
"Boucle du Doubs", the loop made by the Doubs River in
which the city developped itself. Today, the Citadel hosts many
museums (of Natural History, of Resistance and Deportation, Local
Art, etc...) a zoo, and other administrative offices.
The
Royal Saltworks of Arc-et-Senans, near Besançon, was built
by Claude-Nicolas Ledoux. Its construction, begun in 1775 during
the reign of Louis XVI, was the first major achievement of industrial
architecture, reflecting the ideal of progress of the Enlightenment.
This vast, semicircular complex was designed to permit a rational
and hierarchical organization of work and was to have been followed
by the building of an ideal city, a project that was never realized.
Today, one can see how salt was extracted and brought to the Saltworks
in the 18th century, and the different stages of the transformation
of the salted water (saumure) into salt. An permanent exhibition
is devoted to the life and works of Ledoux, a forerunner in modern
city planning. This site is incribed on the World Heritage List
of the UNESCO.
Ornans
is a very interesting and picturesque small town on the Loue River,
with well preserved buildings from the 16th century (city hall,
townhouses) and a 12th century church. It is the hometown of Gustave
Courbet and hosts a small museum dedicated to this great painter
and sculptor of the 19th century. The remarkable interest of Ornans
is it's finely decorated houses and restaurants overhanging the
Loue River.
Belvoir
is an entirely restored medieval fortress of the 12th and 13th centuries.
The visit takes you to all the rooms of the castle, including the
arsenal, the reception room, and the living quarters of the former
inhabitants. A huge medieval arms collection includes a unique chainmail
armor of the 12th century. In one of the rooms you will also discover
a stone-carved cupboard, typical piece of Comtois rural art of the
Middle-Ages.
The
Porte Noire (Black Gate) is one of the biggest Roman triumphal arch
in France. It's colour is due to the fire that devastated the granary
it hosted in the Middle-Ages. Dating back to the 2nd century, the
arch was erected under emperor Marcus-Aurelius and is remarkable
for the size of its sculptures, representing divinities and scenes
of fighting. Just a few metres away stand the ruins of a Roman water-tank
that collected springwater from Arcier (east of Besançon),
via an aqueduct of 15 kilometres.
The
large Roman Theater of Mandeure (142 metres in diameter and about
20000 seats) was part of a vast religious and certainly pilgrimage
ensemble dating back to the end of the 1st century. It was hosted
by the second largest city of Sequania (Roman Franche-Comté),
then called Epomanduodurum. The site is still under excavation,
and large urban areas have been localised, as well as many workshops.
The
fortress of Joux represents a fairly interesting view of the evolution
of military architecture, from it's medieval towers to the half-burried
fortress of the 19th century. It hosts one of Europe's deepest wells,
and the largest French museum for arms and uniforms, with collections
dating from the 18th century to orld War I.
The
oldest museum in France, the museum of Fine-Arts and Archeology
of Besançon is also one of the richest. It's various collections
include Prehistoric times, Archeology (local, Egyptian, Roman and
Greek), Medieval Art, and a large collection of paintings (Tintoretto,
Courbet, Renoir, Rubens, etc...). Local findings (a three horned
sculpted bull) go along international ones (Egyptian sarcophaguses,
ceramics, etc...).
Also
hosted by the Citadel, the museum of Resistance and Deportation
is unique in France. It evokes the exactions of all kinds committed
during World War II. There is also a special room that shows art
works made by prisonners of concentration camps during their imprisonment
that reveals their fears and thoughts. Contemporary works inspired
by this period are also exposed.
This
outdoor ever growing museum depicts the evolution of local housing,
with ancient farms and rural houses, like the "Tuyé"
farm, used for the smoking and conservation of meat. All the houses
were dismantled in their original village, and brought to the site
of the museum to be re-built there, with their original landscape
and environment. They are all completely furnished and give a real
view of what our ancestors living conditions were.
Besançon's
watchmaking past deserved a museum that would depict all the aspects
of horology. This is now done with this quite recent Museum of Time.
Collections of Watches, Comtoises Clocks and exhibitions about the
glorious industrious past of the city and the region in the domain
of time, show the world of precision often unknown of this noble
industry.
