History UsefulNotes / Paris

Some other places of interest:

* The [[EiffelTowerEffect Eiffel Tower]], of course. Originally intended as the entrance arch for the 1889 World's Fair and holding the "tallest building in the world" title until the Chrysler Building took it in 1930.

* The Louvre, the biggest and most famous art museum in France. Most famous for being the home of Creator/LeonardoDaVinci's famed Art/MonaLisa
* The Arc de Triomphe.
* La Cathédrale de Notre-Dame de Paris, known simply as "Notre-Dame" -- a massive French Gothic cathedral on the Île de la Cité in the centre of Paris. Notable for being the subject of Creator/VictorHugo's famous novel ''Literature/TheHunchbackOfNotreDame''.

* The above-mentioned butte Montmartre. A hotbed of artists in the 19th century (mostly painters), the hill is today more known for being used in several movies and as a nightlife area, with several cabarets. It's also the only place where you can find a vineyard in Paris.
* Pigalle, the infamous RedLightDistrict, host to anything not for the prude of heart, including the Moulin Rouge, as well as a lot of retailers of musical instruments.

* Famous cabarets such as the aforementioned Moulin Rouge, the Theatre/CrazyHorse or the Lido.

* The Hotel des Invalides. Formerly a hospital and retirement home for UsefulNotes/LouisXIV 's veterans, it's now home to several museums. The Dôme des Invalides, formerly the royal chapel, hosts the grave of several war heroes of France, including [[UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte some Corsican guy with a bicorne.]]
* The Père Lachaise, a gigantic cemetery full of famous people like Creator/{{Moliere}}, Creator/OscarWilde, Music/FryderykChopin, Music/EdithPiaf or [[Music/TheDoors Jim Morrison]].

* The Louvre, the biggest and most famous art museum in France.

->''"If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast."''
-->-- '''Creator/ErnestHemingway'''

Paris, the capital of UsefulNotes/{{France}}. WithAllDueRespect to [[VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft Shattrath City]], ''this'' is the original City of Light.

** Located on the Champs de Mars built by Gustav Eiffel ([[HeAlsoDid who also designed]] the Bridge Bar-Hakeim, featured in ''Film/{{Inception}}'' and the interior structure of the Statue of Liberty), it is a triumph of ironwork and was intended by Eiffel to be a monument that is futuristic and modern, to contrast the Neoclassical and medieval structures of earlier eras.

** In the 21st Century of course, there were the terrorists' attack on the offices of the satirical newspaper ''Charlie Hebdo'' by Muslim extremists in January 2015. Then there was the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2015_Paris_attacks November terrorist attacks]] that took place the same year, also by Islamic terrorists. And in between, an attempted attack on a Thalys train heading to Paris, immortalized in the film ''Film/TheFifteenSeventeenToParis'' (with the American soldiers who foiled the attack [[AsHimself playing themselves]]). More recently is the April 2019 fire that engulfed Notre Dame, causing immense damage to the iconic building.

It has four ring roads (UsefulNotes/{{London}} only has two), the inner most being the division between the main city and the very poor suburbs... Or the very rich: the GDP per capita of the "Hauts-de-Seine" (the rich suburbs to the North West of Paris) is close to the GDP per capita of the district of Columbia, while the GDP per Capita of some parts of the "Seine-Saint-Denis" (the poorer eastern suburbs) is closer to that of parts of eastern Europe. This is a very old distinction; western Paris has been home to its better-off inhabitants for generations (as any account of the 1789, 1830, and 1848 revolutions can tell you). Still, you can go from the posher parts of the city to the poorer ones in 40 minutes by ''[[UsefulNotes/LeMetropolitain Métro]]''.

* The Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral, known simply as "Notre-Dame" -- a massive French Gothic cathedral on the Île de la Cité in the centre of Paris. Notable for being the subject of Creator/VictorHugo's famous novel ''Literature/TheHunchbackOfNotreDame''.

It has four ring roads (UsefulNotes/{{London}} only has two), the inner most being the division between the main city and the very poor suburbs... Or the very rich: the GDP per capita of the "Hauts-de-Seine" (the rich suburbs to the North West of Paris) is close to the GDP per capita of the district of Columbia, while the GDP per Capita of some parts of the "Seine-Saint-Denis" (the poorer eastern suburbs) is closer to that of parts of eastern Europe. This is a very old distinction; western Paris has been home to its better-off inhabitants for generations (as any account of the 1789, 1830, and 1848 revolutions can tell you). Still, you can go from the posher parts of the city to the poorer ones in 40 minutes by the subway.

The city was pretty much untouched by the two [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI world]] [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII wars]] -- the Germans only got into shelling range of the suburbs in the first, Paris surrendered in 1940 to avoid its destruction, the German commander surrendered it in 1944 against Hitler's orders to destroy it if he couldn't defend it, and nobody wanted to bomb the place.

* The Sacré-Coeur basilica, atop the butte Montmartre. Built as a form of penance after the 1870 defeat against Prussia ''and'' as an homage to the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Commune Paris Commune]], the basilica is still used as a place of pilgrimage for Catholics, but the 130+ meters climb make if hard to access (or take the funicular or the subway elevators if you feel lazy).

The city was pretty much untouched by the two world wars -- the Germans only got into shelling range of the suburbs in the first, Paris surrendered in 1940 to avoid its destruction, the German commander surrendered it in 1944 against Hitler's orders to destroy it if he couldn't defend it, and nobody wanted to bomb the place.

Paris is most famous for its wide boulevards, copied in several other cities around the world. There's of course the [[EiffelTowerEffect Eiffel Tower]], originally intended as the entrance arch for the 1889 World's Fair and holding the "tallest building in the world" title until the Chrysler Building took it in 1930.

* La Cathédrale de Notre-Dame de Paris, known simply as "Notre-Dame" -- a massive French Gothic cathedral on the Île de la Cité in the centre of Paris. A devastating fire in April 2019 destroyed most of the roof and caused the famous spire to collapse, but the main towers and the stained-glass rose windows survived, as did most of the artwork inside. Also notable for being the subject of Creator/VictorHugo's famous novel ''Literature/TheHunchbackOfNotreDame''.

* The Bibliothèque Nationale, both the historical (''Richelieu'' site) and the recent (''Francois Mitterand'' site) buildings, host to both all that is published in France as well as historical records.

** Nevertheless the Paris Commune showed that the city was far from pacified. During the Commune, when the Army was closing in, the Communards set fire on the Hotel de Ville (subsequently rebuilt) and burnt the Palais des Tuileries to the ground.

! Paris in fiction
* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' takes place in modern-day Paris.

--> '''Gustave Eiffel''': ''Not only the art of the modern engineer, but also the century of Industry and Science in which we are living, and for which the way was prepared by [[UsefulNotes/TheEnlightenment the great scientific movement of the eighteenth century]] and by [[UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution the Revolution of 1789]], to which this monument will be built as an expression of France's gratitude.''

In its administrative area (the 75 postal area, split up into twenty numbered administrative districts called "arrondissements", although these sort of things exist all over France), also known as "downtown Paris", the population is only about 2 million, but the total urban sprawl has a population of over 12.5 million (making it the largest urban area in UsefulNotes/TheEuropeanUnion and the second-largest in Europe, after UsefulNotes/{{Moscow}}) and represents 18% of the French population. The region roughly in a 50 km radius around Paris is known as Ile-de-France[[note]]"Island of France" in French[[/note]], and its inhabitants are called "Franciliens" - although French people tend to refer to them all as Parisians.

* The Père Lachaise, a gigantic cemetery full of famous people like Music/FryderykChopin, Music/EdithPiaf or [[Music/TheDoors Jim Morrison]].

* La Cathédrale de Notre-Dame de Paris, known simply as "Notre-Dame" -- a massive French Gothic cathedral on the Île de la Cité in the centre of Paris. A devastating fire in April 2019 destroyed most of the roof and caused the famous spire to collapse, but somehow the main towers and, more remarkably, the stained-glass rose windows survived, as did most of the artwork inside. Also notable for being the subject of Creator/VictorHugo's famous novel ''Literature/TheHunchbackOfNotreDame''.

In its administrative area (the 75 postal area, split up into twenty numbered administrative districts called "arrondissements", although these sort of things exist all over France), also known as "downtown Paris", the population is only about 2 million, but the total urban sprawl has a population of over 12.5 million (making it the largest urban area in UsefulNotes/TheEuropeanUnion and the second-largest in Europe, after UsefulNotes/{{Moscow}}) and represents 18% of the French population. The region roughly in a 50 km radius around Paris is known as Ile-de-France, and its inhabitants are called "Franciliens" - although French people tend to refer to them all as Parisians.

** Historically, Paris is the site of infamous massacres - the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre (with 30,000 dead in three days), the events of the French Revolution (especially the September Massacres and the final months of the ReignOfTerror when all executions were conducted in the capital), the Bloody Week of the Paris Commune (30,000 dead in a single week), the Protests in 1961 when the French Police led by Maurice Papon killed 400 Algerians and dumped their bodies in the Seine. These and other incidents are portrayed in works by Dumas, Dickens and in the case of the Algerian massacre, the Creator/MichaelHaneke film ''Caché''.

** In the 21st Century of course, there were the terrorists' attack on the offices of the satirical newspaper ''Charlie Hebdo'' by Muslim extremists in January 2015. Then there was the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2015_Paris_attacks November terrorist attacks]] that took place '''the same year''', also by Islamic terrorists. And in between, an attempted attack on a Thalys train heading to Paris, immortalized in the film ''Film/TheFifteenSeventeenToParis'' (with the American soldiers who foiled the attack [[AsHimself playing themselves]]). More recently is the April 2019 fire that engulfed Notre Dame, causing immense damage to the iconic building.

* StarvingArtist: The city used to be a haven for them and still represented as such in fictional depictions.. Creator/VincentVanGogh, the Impressionists, bad boy poets Francois Villon and Arthur Rimbaud, Creator/JamesJoyce and the Modernists, surrealists, jazz musicians, experimental film-makers across the world who, like Creator/WoodyAllen notes, "thank God the French exist" as a market for their films. The reason it attracted them was that the rents were cheaper back then, the Louvre (and the Cinematheque) was open till late at night for their perusal, lots of sidewalk cafes and a good night life. Since the rise of neoliberalism in the 80s and 90s, Paris, like many world cities, has become quite expensive which many feel compromises the qualities that made it so great in the first place.

Despite all of the above, Paris has been suffering some backlash in the recent years due to it's ''legendary'' traffic and dirt issues, dog droppings and cigarette butts being the main offenders. The city has however taken heed of the complaints and is working to improve the current state of the city by both transforming several streets and roundabouts into parks and footpaths, while at the same time promoting the use of public transit, walking and other alternative means of transportation (such as car-sharing or cycling) while clamping down on incivilities such as littering, taking a page or two out of Singapore's book on the matter.