History Image Bank - Western Europe II

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The Trevi Fountain in Rome, a famous spot for lovers, represents Baroque exuberance.

The Spanish Steps are another of Rome's signature sites.

Fishermen at the port of Camogli, on Italy's western coast, are repairing their nets, as have their forefathers for millennia.

This dolmen at Carnac, in Brittany, is a neolithic burial chamber, consisting of a large, flat stone laid across upright boulders. It lies in a field of numerous menhirs, or large free-standing stones erected for astronomical or perhaps religious purposes.

After Julius Ceasar conquered Gaul in 52 B.C.E., the Roman Empire constructed some of its finest architectural triumphs there, such as this temple in Nîmes. It was used subsequently as a fort, a warehouse, a private dwelling, a stable, and a church. Thomas Jefferson so admired the temple that he used it as a model for the Virginia state capitol.

This aqueduct in Provence, known as the Pont du Gard, testifies to the brilliance of Roman engineering. Here we see three levels of uncemented blocks, each weighing two tons, that were quarried from the banks of the river.

The eighth-century castle at Les Baux in Provence was constructed as a refuge from Saracen raids for the local population. Like most sites in Europe, it endured a long succession of landlords, thus contributing to a fascinating if complex history.

The Abbey of Mont-Saint-Michel off the coast of Normandy was constructed in the tenth century. Heavily fortified, it withstood many invasions during the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of Religion, and was made into a prison by Napoleon.

Completed in 12this Loire Valley castle at Angers is built on large drumtowers rising from the rock. Their massive size, when added to the impressive moat, offered protection against foolhardy attackers.

The medieval fortified city of Carcassonne in southern France was one of the few walled towns never to be captured by attackers, not even by the notorious Black Prince.

Begun in the tenth century, the Benedictine Abbey of Cluny was at one time the largest church in the world. Cluny, in eastern France, was a leading ecclesiastical and cultural center of Europe. Largely destroyed in 1790 by the French Revolution, the vaulted Gothic ceiling of the wine cellar, seen here, still survives.

The church of Sainte Madeleine at Vézelay is considered a gem of Romanesque art and architecture. This twelfth-century tympanum, or sculptured panel above the entrance, combined with the numerous stone carvings decorating the columns in the interior, visually told the stories of the Christian Gospels to the illiterate faithful of the times.

The interior of the Vézelay church, shown here, witnessed the famous sermon by St. Bernard of Clairvaux as he blessed the Crusaders on their departure for the Second Crusade in 1146 Note the pre-Gothic Romanesque vaulted ceiling with its rounded arches reminiscent of Byzantine architecture.

The church of Sainte Chapelle was built in 1243 by Louis IX of France to house Jesus's Crown of Thorns, which Louis reputedly brought back from the Holy Land after the Sixth Crusade. The upper chapel, with its soaring vaulted ceiling, resembles a luminous jeweled reliquary, with more than three-quarters of its exterior walls composed of stained glass windows. After being damaged during the French Revolution, the windows were restored in the nineteenth century.

Begun in 1163 and completed 200 years later, the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris was built with the skill and religious ardor of the common people: stonemasons, iron workers, sculptors, glass workers, and carpenters. Notre Dame has witnessed many major religious and political occasions, and represents the soul of Paris. During the French Revolution, it was rededicated to the "Cult of Reason" and used for storage. Like many of the historical buildings of Paris, it has just been cleaned of centuries of grime.

The Bayeux Cathedral in northern France, with its soaring vaulted ceiling and somber grey stone, is an excellent example of Norman Gothic architecture. Like all European cathedrals, it has undergone numerous architectural modifications over the centuries.

The fortified medieval bridge at Cahors in central France.

The bridge at Avignon, on the Rhone River in southern France, is known for the round "Sur le Pont d'Avignon," sung by children all over the world.

The castles on the Loire River in France are considered among the architectural gems of the Renaissance. Like cathedrals, such castles were not static constructs but were modified over the centuries. Here we see the unusual exterior staircase of the sixteenth-century late Gothic castle of Blois, which was the residence of both Louis XII and Francis I of France.

Another Renaissance gem in the Loire Valley is the Castle of Chenonceaux. The long galleries over the river witnessed gala dinners and balls given by the Queen Catherine de Medici.

The immense Palace of Versailles radiates the glory that was the reign of the Sun King, Louis XIV. The greatest architectural enterprise of the seventeenth century, Versailles is reputed to have housed 20,000 people, including nobles, soldiers, servants, merchants, and staff, all in less than ideal hygienic conditions. The palace became the hermetically sealed bastion within which Louis XIV could centralize his royal authority.

Louis XIV's canopy bed with gold brocade drapes. As the result of the creation of such opulent surroundings, it is little wonder that the state's coffers were emptying. Nonetheless, Versailles became the envy and model for the palaces of subsequent European rulers.

Every room at Versailles boasted ceiling and wall decorations, parquet floors, marble fireplace mantels, mirrors, brocade drapes, paintings, and statues. Here we see one of Marie Antoinette's salons in the Queen's vast apartments.

In 1806 Napoleon commissioned the construction of the Arch of Triumph in Paris to honor the soldiers who had earned French military victories throughout Europe. It is patterned on the victory arches of ancient Rome.

Wine cultivation was brought to Gaul by the ancient Greeks; thenceforth, vineyards such as these have been covering French hills for the past two millennia. Here we see a winery, which is most often located in a castle, because the thick walls keep the temperature constant.

This view of the Pointe du Hoc along the Atlantic Coast of Normandy shows the forbidding cliffs that were stormed by Allied troops at the beginning of the D-Day Invasion on June 19

The church in Sainte Mère Eglise on the Normandy peninsula became famous when, on the night before D-Day, several of the first American airborne troops who arrived to reinforce the Allied offensive perished on its steeple.

This building outside of Paris, constructed by the famed French architect Le Corbusier, epitomizes the modernist style of "function over form" and shows the characteristic unadorned simple lines and white color preferred by the internationalists.

Built over the medieval marketplace of Paris, the Pompidou Center towers as a monument to contemporary architecture. With its elevators and pipes on the exterior, it frees the interior of the building for more space to house the libraries and art collections that make this one of the most popular sites in Paris today