Grez-sur-Loing to Nemours

[French Mystique Tours]

Today I'll take you for a bike ride to the medieval town of Nemours. Before we get there we'll start the journey in the pretty little village of Grez-sur-Loing so let's go.

[French Mystique Tours]

That's all for Grez-sur-Loing. I hope you enjoyed it. Now let's move along.






The next village was Moncourt-Fromonville. The towns I visted today were all located on the Canal du Loing and Moncourt was no different.








The town hall is housed in a 17th century château.










Leaving the town and entering the countryside again I got a few fine pictures of the lovely foliage.







Here is the 12th century church, which is on the waiting list to be classified a national monument.

[French Mystique Tours]

The next town was Nemours. I had a specific destination in mind in visiting Nemours. It is the home of the Musée de la Préhistoire d'Ile de France (Museum of the Prehistory of Ile de France) and since I love prehistory I wanted to pay it a visit. If you are a lover of prehistory then this museum and another museum of prehistory located in Saint-Germain-en-Laye (just outside Paris) are worth a visit. There is a section of the museum devoted to both prehistoric and modern forensics. Have you ever seen those TV programs where they find an old skull, or that of a recent murder victim, and an artist does a reconstruction of what that person looked like? Well some of that work is done in the museum in Nemours. There were some outstanding full scale reproductions of our primitive ancestors along with a large variety of artifacts found all over the Ile de France region. They also have a reproduction of Otzi The Ice Man, the neolithic hunter whose corpse was recovered high in the Alps preserved in ice.




In the low lighting conditions I couldn't get my basic model digital camera to get a non-blurry photo so I apologize for that. In person you'll be able to see that the models are quite well done and life like.








Here's the replica of the artists work studio.




One of their remarkable artifacts is a Carolingien era dug out canoe from the 9th or 10th century.








There was also a pretty cool engraved menhir.

[French Mystique Tours]

Here is what is known as a polissoir, an ancient tool sharpening stone.




Here's a reconstruction of a covered alley type dolmen (burial chamber) from the town of Presles in the Val d'Oise region. I believe it is still intact in its original location.




There are a number of menhirs and dolmens scattered throughout the Ile de france region and I've visited several of them. Some of them have engravings or other forms of prehistoric artwork that must have had symbolic significance for the artists. Here's a photo of female breasts and a necklace found in one such dolmen in the Vexin region. The dolmen is still there but I'm not sure it's open to the public.




Here's a plaster relief of some art work that is found in a dolmen that I visited some time ago. Next to it is an artists recreation of the artwork, since it is barely discernible on the stone itself.



The cross is obviously a later add on, probably an attempt to Christianize a heathen monument. Of course, the museum has plenty of stone tools.






There were also some Gallo-Roman artifacts from the 1st to 4th centuries A.D. If I found these objects in my backyard at first glance I would think they were from the 19th century.




Leaving the museum I noticed there were a few art installations set up on the grounds of the museum. Some of it was rather, um, suggestive.




Now it was time to pay the old downtown of Nemours a visit. Nemours is a charming medieval town which still retains several buildings from this period of its history. In the 12th century Gauthier I, founder of Nemours, built a château and also a church to house the relics of John the Baptist. With the basic infrastructure in place a town grew up around Gauthier's newly established domain. In the 13th century the domain was sold to the king of France and in the 15th century the region was elevated to the status of duchy and became the capital of the historic region known as Gâtinais français. In 1672 Louis XIV gave the duchy to his brother, Philippe d'Orléans. The royal domain lasted until the Revolution. In the 19th century the village and region profited from the existence of sandy deposits in its environs and a glass making industry sprang up. Nonetheless, the principal economic activity of the region remained, and still remains, agriculture.

[French Mystique Tours]

Market day.






Below is the church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste (John the Baptist). Its oldest parts date to the 12th century with later additions in the 16th and 17th centuries.







Below is the Château de Nemours, a 12th century château which underwent modifications with its successive owners. To save it from ruin some local artists decided to transform it into a museum. Today it features different exhibits of painting, sculpture, prints etc.











That's the end of the report.