La question pas si bête : pourquoi Bordeaux est surnommée “le port de la Lune” ?
Through Nicolas gosselin
Published on
Like the Pink City for Toulouse, Bordeaux such a small son nickname. Several centuries ago, the city of Gironde was named “The port of the Moon”.
To understand where this term comes from, no need to look up to the sky but it is better to take a little height.
From the window of an airplane, everything lights up. At Bordeaux level, the Garonne bends and we recognize the shape of a crescent moon.
An emblem since the Middle Ages
“It is most certainly for this reason that men settled here more than 2000 years ago. This rounding breaks the current of the Garonne and makes it possible not to have a tidal bore, but also to protect the boats from this extremely strong current, ”says Agathe Corre, guide-lecturer at the Bordeaux Métropole tourist office and president of the ‘AGNA (Association of Guides of Nouvelle-Aquitaine).
Based on this history, the crescent moon is the city’s oldest emblem. In the middle of the Middle Ages, we already found on milestones (the equivalent of today’s milestones) three intertwined crescents to designate Bordeaux.
“This is the identity of the city, continues Agathe Corre. The main characteristic of Bordeaux is to have organized itself according to the Garonne and this very particular shape. The city was built in symbiosis with the river. “
Recognition by Unesco in 2007
In addition, where Bordeaux was built, there are two rivers essential to the development of the city a few centuries ago.
The Peugue and the Devèze, two watercourses that cross old Bordeaux and flow into the Garonne, made it possible to return by boat inland and to shelter from flooding.
At 19e century, for sanitation reasons, they were channeled and integrated into the underground sewer network. La Peugue passes under the Cours Alsace-Lorraine in particular and the Devèze, under the rue de la Devise for example.
All this construction and organization of the city around the river was retained by Unesco when the historic center was listed as a World Heritage Site in 2007 under the name “Bordeaux, the port of the Moon”.
A crescent moon at the origin of Bordeaux
This recognition can be explained in part by the embellishment work orchestrated around the urban project of 1995 by Alain Juppé, with in particular the cleaning of the facades or the requalification of the quays in promenade, but above all by “an urban unity and coherence and remarkable architectural features ”.
“Because of its port, Bordeaux, a city of trade and commerce, has retained its original functions since its creation. Its history is clearly legible in its urban plan, from the Roman castrum 20e century. The city has retained its authenticity in terms of the historic buildings and spaces created in the 18e and at 19e century ”, underlines Unesco.
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