m@rco
March 13th, 2007, 06:50 PM
Vienne is a commune of France, located 30 km south of Lyon, on the Rhône River. It is the second city after Grenoble in the Isère department, of which it is a subprefecture. Population (2001): 29,400.
From wikipedia
Roman Vienne
The oppidum of the Allobroges became a Roman colony about 47 BC under Julius Caesar, but the Allobroges managed to expel them: the exiles then founded the colony of Lugdunum (today's Lyon). Under the early Empire Vienna (as the Romans called it, not to be confused with today's Vienna [German Wien], which the Romans called Vindobona) regained all its former privileges as a Roman colony. Later it became a provincial capital. In 257 Postumus was proclaimed emperor here of a short-lived Gallo-Roman empire with its capital at Trier. On the bank of the Gre are traces of the ramparts of the old Roman city, and on Mont Pipet (east of the town) are the remains of a Roman theatre, while the ruined 13th century castle there was built on Roman footings. Several ancient aqueducts and traces of Roman roads can still be seen.
Two Roman monuments at Vienne are outstanding. One is the temple of Augusta and Livia, a rectangular building of the Corinthian order, erected by the emperor Claudius, which owes its survival, like the Maison Carrée at Nîmes, to being converted to a church soon after the Theodosian decrees as "Notre Dame de Vie." In it the local Festival of Reason at the time of the Reign of Terror. The other is the Plan de l'Aiguille, a truncated pyramid resting on a portico with four arches, from the Roman circus. Many popular theories have been advanced as to what this structure was intended for, even the legend of Pontius Pilate has made this his tomb.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/73/Vienne-RomanTemple2.JPG/800px-Vienne-RomanTemple2.JPG
http://www.euratlas.com/Atlas/france_provence/vienne_temple.jpg
http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/sharemed/targets/images/pho/t637/T637388A.jpg
From wikipedia
Roman Vienne
The oppidum of the Allobroges became a Roman colony about 47 BC under Julius Caesar, but the Allobroges managed to expel them: the exiles then founded the colony of Lugdunum (today's Lyon). Under the early Empire Vienna (as the Romans called it, not to be confused with today's Vienna [German Wien], which the Romans called Vindobona) regained all its former privileges as a Roman colony. Later it became a provincial capital. In 257 Postumus was proclaimed emperor here of a short-lived Gallo-Roman empire with its capital at Trier. On the bank of the Gre are traces of the ramparts of the old Roman city, and on Mont Pipet (east of the town) are the remains of a Roman theatre, while the ruined 13th century castle there was built on Roman footings. Several ancient aqueducts and traces of Roman roads can still be seen.
Two Roman monuments at Vienne are outstanding. One is the temple of Augusta and Livia, a rectangular building of the Corinthian order, erected by the emperor Claudius, which owes its survival, like the Maison Carrée at Nîmes, to being converted to a church soon after the Theodosian decrees as "Notre Dame de Vie." In it the local Festival of Reason at the time of the Reign of Terror. The other is the Plan de l'Aiguille, a truncated pyramid resting on a portico with four arches, from the Roman circus. Many popular theories have been advanced as to what this structure was intended for, even the legend of Pontius Pilate has made this his tomb.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/73/Vienne-RomanTemple2.JPG/800px-Vienne-RomanTemple2.JPG
http://www.euratlas.com/Atlas/france_provence/vienne_temple.jpg
http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/sharemed/targets/images/pho/t637/T637388A.jpg