Auxerre - History

History

Auxerre was a flourishing Gallo-Roman centre, then called Antissiodorum, through which passed one of the main roads of the area, the Via Agrippa (1st century AD) which crossed the Yonne River (Gallo-Roman Icauna) here. In the third century it became the seat of a bishop and a provincial capital of the Roman Empire. In the 5th century it received a Cathedral. In the late 11th-early 12th century the existing communities were included inside a new line of walls built by the feudal Counts of Auxerre.

Bourgeois activities accompanied the traditional land and wine cultivations starting from the twelfth century, and Auxerre developed into a commune with a Town Hall of its own. The Burgundian city, which became part of France under King Louis XI, suffered during the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of Religion. In 1567 it was captured by the Huguenots, and many of the Catholic edifices were damaged. The medieval ramparts were demolished in the 18th century.

In the 19th century numerous heavy infrastructures were built, including a railway station, a psychiatric hospital and the courts, and new quarters were developed on the right bank of the Yonne.

In parts of France during the war, there were so few men around, because of the prisoners of war and forced labor sent to Germany, that old problems returned. Wolves returned to Burgundy. In the tenth century the packs of wolves were so large and vicious, that they forced the Dukes of Burgundy from their capital in Auxerre to the safer regions of Dijon. When faced with starvation, the wolves would also eat the grapes. During World War II, a pack of starving wolves had eaten the grapes, and had become intoxicated. The drunken wolf pack ran into the center of the town, where they lay down in a drunken stupor. “The wolves were all intoxicated… they were too drunk to remember they were wolves.” At that point, the frightened townspeople Auxerre came out with their kitchen knives and dispatched the wolves. “They just lay down in the street, stupidly drunk,” Monsieur Le Brun said.

In 1995 it was named "Town of Art and History".