Royan

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Royan
Royan Coat of Arms
Royan (France)
Royan
region Nouvelle-Aquitaine
Department Charente-Maritime
Arrondissement Rochefort
Canton Royan
Community association Royan Atlantique
Coordinates 45 ° 38 ′  N , 1 ° 2 ′  W Coordinates: 45 ° 38 ′  N , 1 ° 2 ′  W
height 0-35 m
surface 19.30 km 2
Residents 18,398 (January 1, 2017)
Population density 953 inhabitants / km 2
Post Code 17200
INSEE code 17306
Website Official site of the city of Royan

Royan as seen from the Gironde estuary

Royan [rwa.jɑ] is a southwestern French town with 18,398 inhabitants (at January 1, 2017) in the department of Charente-Maritime  (17) in the region Nouvelle-Aquitaine . It belongs to the Arrondissement of Rochefort .

location

Royan is situated on the Atlantic Ocean , at the estuary of the Gironde . The next larger cities are Saintes (approx. 42 kilometers to the northeast) and Rochefort (approx. 40 kilometers north), Bordeaux is approx. 120 kilometers to the southeast. There is a ferry connection between Royan and Le Verdon-sur-Mer via the approx. 15 km wide estuary.

Population development

year 1962 1968 1975 1982 1990 1999 2006 2016
Residents 16,521 17,292 18,062 17,540 16,837 17.102 18,202 18,372

In the 19th century the town recorded a steady increase in population from 2,100 inhabitants in 1800 to over 8,300 in 1896. By 1936 the number of inhabitants rose to over 12,000, but after the destruction of World War II, only a good 6,000 people lived in the city. However, a few years later it again had over 12,000 inhabitants.

economy

Due to its location at the Gironde estuary, Royan was predestined as a port city. From here, grain, wine and other Charente goods were shipped to the north of France, but also exported to other European countries. Nowadays tourism is again playing an important role in the city's economic life. Since 2013, Royan has been the seat of the newly founded communal association Communauté d'agglomération Royan Atlantique , which is expected to provide further impetus for the region's economic development.

A ferry service that runs several times a day leads across the Gironde to 'Le Verdon sur Mer' to the southern, long Medoc peninsula on the left bank of the Gironde. There is a rail connection through the Medoc to Bordeaux- St-Jean.

history

Royan on the right bank of the Gironde (1634), engraving by Christophe Tassin

A settlement probably already existed here in Roman times ; During the migration period it was surrounded by a palisade wall to protect it from the Visigoths . A Viking raid has been recorded in 844; During this time, Royan belonged to the Carolingian sub-kingdom of Aquitaine , which rose in the new duchy of Aquitaine at the beginning of the 10th century . In 1137 Eleanor of Aquitaine married the French King Louis VII ; However, the marriage failed and was divorced in 1152, clearing the way for Eleanor to marry again in 1154 with Heinrich Plantagenet, who became King of England a little later as Henry II . Since both France and England claimed Aquitaine for themselves, there were armed conflicts in the following centuries, which ultimately resulted in the Hundred Years War (1337-1453). During this time Royan changed king several times and suffered severe devastation until it finally fell to the French crown in 1451. In the 16th century, a large Protestant community formed in the city, which after the Huguenot Wars (1562–1598) was given to the Protestants in the Edict of Nantes as a 'fortified place'. But already in 1622 Royan was by the troops of Louis XIII. besieged; the city surrendered and the residents renounced the Protestant faith. But shortly afterwards there was renewed unrest, whereupon the king had the city set on fire. During the French Revolution , Royan was briefly the capital of the Charente-Inférieure department , which was only renamed Charente-Maritime in 1941 .

Napalm attack on April 15, 1945

Royan was a fashionable seaside resort in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. However, this situation ended at the end of the Second World War : in a British air raid on January 5, 1945, the city occupied by German troops was almost completely destroyed. A few weeks before the German surrender, Royan was held by German troops far from the front line at the time. In mid-April, the city was once again attacked by the US Air Force . Napalm was used extensively .

In the 1950s and 1960s, the city was rebuilt on a completely new floor plan according to the rules of modern architecture, as the French Ministry for Reconstruction had declared Royan to be a “laboratory for urban development research”.

Culture and sights

See also: List of Monuments historiques in Royan

To replace the destroyed during the war Church Royans a protruding beyond the downtown church was Notre Dame from reinforced concrete built. The intention was to create a church with the aesthetics of large Gothic cathedrals as a memorial. Construction work began in 1955, and the completed church was consecrated in 1958. The new Notre-Dame church has an elliptical shape with a base area of ​​45 x 22 m. The height of the integrated bell tower is 60 m. In 1988 this church was classified as a historic monument and a listed building.

In 1963, Bernard Gachet founded the Festival international d'art contemporain de Royan , which was held annually around Easter from 1964 to 1977. The festival de musique contemporaine was at the center of the multi-discipline event . Harry Halbreich was its artistic director from 1964 to 1972 . The festival has premiered numerous well-known contemporary composers, including Iannis Xenakis , Krzysztof Penderecki , Karlheinz Stockhausen , Jean Barraqué , Luciano Berio , Vinko Globokar , Mauricio Kagel , Brian Ferneyhough , Cristóbal Halffter , Gilbert Amy , Bruno Maderna , Wolfgang Riñeshm , Emmanuel Nuñeshm , Isang Yun , Friedrich Cerha and many others. In the 1970s, the budget of the festival shrank and it was discontinued under President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing (Secretary of State for Culture Françoise Giroud , who held office until 1977).

Personalities

Town twinning

literature

  • Le Patrimoine des Communes de la Charente-Maritime. Flohic Editions, Volume 2, Paris 2002, ISBN 2-84234-129-5 , pp. 757-778.

Web links

Commons : Royan  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Les Ferrys (only in france) [1]
  2. ↑ Transgironde.fr [2] , in English: [3]
  3. ↑ SNCF 'Le Verdon' - 'Bordaux St-Jean' [4]
  4. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of March 4, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ The Zinn reader: writings on disobedience and democracy Howard Zinn p. 267 ff & 276 [5]