Nancy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Commune of Nancy | |
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| Place Stanislas - Fountain of Amphitrite | |
| Location | |
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| Coordinates | |
| Administration | |
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| Country | France |
| Region | Lorraine |
| Department | Meurthe-et-Moselle (préfecture) |
| Arrondissement | Nancy |
| Canton | Chief town of 4 cantons |
| Intercommunality | Communauté urbaine du Grand Nancy |
| Mayor | André Rossinot (2001-2008) |
| Statistics | |
| Altitude | 188 m–353 m (avg. 212 m) |
| Land area¹ | 15.01 km² |
| Population² (2005) |
105,400 |
| - Density (1999) | 6,902/km² |
| Miscellaneous | |
| INSEE/Postal code | 54395/ 54000 |
| ¹ French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km² (0.386 mi² or 247 acres) and river estuaries. | |
| ² Population sans doubles comptes: single count of residents of multiple communes (e.g. students and military personnel). | |
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Nancy (IPA pronounciation /nɑ̃si/; archaic German: Nanzig; Luxembourgish: Nanzeg) is a city and commune in the Lorraine région of northeastern France.
The city is the préfecture (capital) of the Meurthe-et-Moselle département. The metropolitan area (aire urbaine) of Nancy had a population of 410,509 inhabitants at the 1999 census, 103,602 of whom lived in the city of Nancy proper (105,100 inhabitants in the city proper as of 2004 estimates).
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[edit] History
The earliest signs of human settlement in the area date back to 800 BC. Early settlers were likely attracted by easily mined iron ore and a ford in the Meurthe River. A small fortified town named Nanciacum (Nancy) was built by Duke Gérard around 1050.
Nancy was sacked by Emperor Frederick II in the 13th century, then rebuilt in stone over the next few centuries as it grew in importance as the capital of the Duchy of Lorraine. Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, was defeated and killed in the Battle of Nancy in 1477.
With the death of Duke Stanislas in 1766, the duchy became a French province and Nancy remained its capital. When the région of Lorraine was created in the middle of the 20th century, Metz was chosen as its capital instead of Nancy.
[edit] Geography
The neighboring communes of Nancy are: Jarville-la-Malgrange, Laxou, Malzéville, Maxéville, Saint-Max, Tomblaine, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, and Villers-lès-Nancy.
[edit] Sights
The Place Stanislas[1] named after the Polish king and duke of Lorraine Stanislaw Leszczynski, Place de la Carrière, and Place d'Alliance were added on the World Heritage Sites list by the UNESCO in 1983.
The "École de Nancy", a group of artists and architects founded by the glassmaster and furniture maker Émile Gallé, worked in the Art Nouveau style at the end of the 19th century and the early 20th century. It was principally their work which made Nancy a centre of art and architecture that rivaled Paris and helped give the city the nickname "Capital de l'Est." The city still possesses many Art Nouveau buildings (mostly banks or private homes). Furniture, glassware, and other pieces of the decorative arts are conserved at the Musée de l'École de Nancy, which is housed in the 1909 villa of Eugène Corbin, a Nancy businessman and supporter of the Art Nouveau there.
The old city centre's heritage dates from the Middle Ages to the 18th century. we can find a lot of shops near to the station. [Nancy Cathedral:[2],[3]]
There is also a botanical garden in Nancy, France. It is open from 10am to 12noon, and from 2 pm to 5 pm on mondays through fridays. On saturdays and sundays it is open from 2pm to 5pm. It costs around 2,30 euros to enter, and has many different types of plants, including tropical, and many other wonderful types of plants and flowers.
[edit] Culture
At the turn of the 20th century, Nancy was a major centre of the Art Nouveau style.
It is the seat of the Diocese of Nancy.
[edit] Transport
Nancy is served by a 'tramway on tyres', in actual fact a guided busway based on Bombardier Transportation's Guided Light Transit technology. It has suffered many incidents and malfunctions, but now works without significant problems. This system is also used in Caen, and will be built in the city of Nijmegen.
[edit] Miscellaneous
The N ray, which turned out to be a figment of local physicist René-Prosper Blondlot's imagination, was named for Nancy.
Nancy's archaic German name is Nanzig, and a similar form Nanzeg is still used in Luxembourgish.
The motto of the city is Non inultus premor, Latin for "No one touches me with impunity". This is very similar to the Scottish motto Nemo me impune lacessit, and both are references to the thistle, which is a symbol of both Scotland and Lorraine (province).
[edit] Universities and colleges
- Université Henri Poincaré (Nancy 1) [4]
- Université de Nancy 2 [5]
- Institut National Polytechnique de Lorraine
- École des Beaux-Arts de Nancy
- École nationale supérieure des industries chimiques (ENSIC)
- École nationale supérieure d'électricité et de mécanique (ENSEM)
- École nationale supérieure des Mines de Nancy
- École Supérieure des Sciences et Technologies de l'Ingénieur de Nancy or ESSTIN
- École Supérieure d'Informatique et Applications de Lorraine or ESIAL
- Institut commercial de Nancy (ICN Nancy)
- Sciences Po Paris (French-German Undergraduate Campus) [6]
[edit] Births
Nancy was the birthplace of:
- Christina, Grand Duchess of Tuscany (1565-1637)
- Jacques Callot (c.1592-1635), baroque graphics artist, draftsman and printmaker
- Louis Maimbourg (1610-1686), Jesuit and historian
- Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (1708-1765), duke of Lorraine and later Holy Roman Emperor
- Jean François de Saint-Lambert (1716-1803), poet
- Joseph Ducreux (1735-1802), portrait painter, pastelist, miniaturist, and engraver
- Antoine Drouot (1774-1847), one of Napoleon's generals
- Edmond de Goncourt (1822-1896), author, critic, publisher, founder of the Académie Goncourt
- Lucien Febvre (1878-1956), historian
- Najoua Belyzel (b. 1981) singer
- Marie Henri d'Arbois de Jubainville (1827-1910), historian and philologist
- Émile Gallé (1846-1904), Art Nouveau artist
- René-Prosper Blondlot (1849-1930), physicist, best remembered for his mistaken identification of N rays
- Henri Poincaré (1854-1912), mathematician, theoretical scientist and philosopher of science
- Louis Hubert Gonzalve Lyautey (1854-1934), marshal of France
- Henri Cartan (b. 1904), mathematician
- Pierre Schaeffer (1910-1995), noted as the inventor of musique concrète
- François Jacob (b. 1920), biologist
- Pascal Dusapin (b. 1955), composer
[edit] Hometown of These Fictional Characters
- René François Artois ('Allo 'Allo)
- René Artois ('Alllo 'Allo [Twin brother of René François Artois])
- Madame de Verquin A fictional libertine in Marquis de Sade's short story Florville and Courval.
[edit] Twinned towns
Newcastle, United Kingdom (since 1954)
Liège, Belgium (since 1954)
Karlsruhe, Germany (since 1955)
Padua, Italy (since 1964)
Kanazawa, Japan (since 1973)
Qiryat Shemona, Israel (since 1984)
Lublin, Poland (since 1988)
Cincinnati, United States (since 1991)
[edit] See also
- Capture of Nancy - The American World War II operation to liberate Nancy.
- AS Nancy-Lorraine, the local football club
[edit] External links
- City council website (in French)
- Tourist office website
- Photographs of Nancy by Gregory Jacquier
- Place Stanislas Nancy
- Place Stanislas - Live Webcam
- Young European Federalists in Nancy and around in Lorraine
- Botanical Gardens
[edit] Art Nouveau-Related External Links
- Official website of le Musée de l'Ecole de Nancy (the museum of the Nancy style of Art Nouveau (in French)
- Nancy tourism office page on the "School of Nancy" Museum (in English)
- A walking tour of Nancy's Art Nouveau architecture including photos (in French)
Overseas departments
Cayenne (French Guiana) • Basse-Terre (Guadeloupe) • Fort-de-France (Martinique) • Saint-Denis (Réunion)
![[2]](http://photos-de-nancy.altata.org/image.php/Monuments_religieux__Cathedrale_-_Cathedrale_1.1600.jpg){kind=link}
![[3]](http://photoenligne2.free.fr/MeurtheetMoselle/Nancy/Cathedrale/D7952.jpg){kind=link}