![]() In 1355, the pope decided to construct new bulwarks to protect against pillaging bands. The population overruns the now too tight city walls. The city, transformed, adorns itself with gothic monuments : reconstruction, enlarging and embellishment of churches, monasteries and convents. The Petit Palais and the Livree Ceccano are beautiful examples the latter now houses the municipal library. All over the city and its environs, the cardinals had built sumptuous residences, each rivaling the other in magnificence and ostentation. At the time of his successor's, Clement VI, death, the palace was practically completed. This number, very elevated for the time, made Avignon one of the largest cities in Europe, and certainly the most cosmopolitan.Ĭonstruction of the celebrated Popes' Palace, a fortified palace of a colossal spread, began in 1335, under the pontificate of Benoit XII. Avignon counted an estimated 40,000 inhabitants. The installation of the pope and his court provoked a tremendous increase in population. These 67 years radically transformed the city, and left a marked imprint, to which the city today owes its world renown. Pacified, Provence enjoyed a profound peace for half a century.ĭuring the first period, from 1309 to 1376, six successive popes resided in Avignon: Clement V, Jean XXII, Benoit XII, Clement VI, Innocent VI et Urban V. The city itself belonged to Charles II of Anjou, Count of Provence as well as king of Naples, making him a vassal and faithful ally of the pope. Avignon lies adjacent to the County of Venaissin, church land since 1274. After the schism between the eastern and western church, Rome found herself outside the center of Catholic Christianity, of which the kingdoms of France and England formed the two great and rival powers. The pope no longer wanted to stay in a Rome torn by rival clans, prey to constant riots and uprisings. The choice of Avignon as a permanent residence was essentially the result of political considerations. It was, nonetheless, the role that the city would play for a hundred years. When Pope Clement V came to Avignon in 1309, received by the Dominicans, he had no intention of establishing himself permanently, nor of creating a new Christian capital in Avignon. Innocent IV, for example, sojourned several years in Lyon between 12. The city counts a population of 4000 to 6000, which is a high number for the Middle Ages.įor a long time already, and certainly during the second half of the 13th century, the pope resided regularly outside of Rome. After some whimsical rebellions against Capetien authority, the Avigonnais seem to have become wiser for their troubles. ![]() If she didn't recover the powerful rôle in the region to which she aspired the city did rapidly dress its wounds : the Saint Benezet bridge was repaired, and the outer ramparts were reconstructed. In the beginning of the 14th century Avignon recovered from the events of the preceding century.
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