Rouen

Sister cities

• Ningbo
• Jeju
• Cleveland
• Hanover
• Salerno
• Norwich

History

Rouen was founded by the Gaulish tribe of the Veliocasses, who controlled a large area in the lower Seine valley. They called it Ratumacos; the Romans called it Rotomagus. It was considered the second city of Gallia Lugdunensis after Lugdunum (Lyon) itself. Under the reorganization of Diocletian, Rouen was the chief city of the divided province Lugdunensis secunda and reached the apogee of its Roman development, with an amphitheatre and thermae of which foundations remain. In the 5th century, it became the seat of a bishopric and later a capital of Merovingian Neustria. From their first incursion into the lower valley of the Seine in 841, the Normans overran Rouen. From 912, Rouen was the capital of the Duchy of Normandy and residence of the local dukes, until William the Conqueror moved his residence to Caen. In 1150, Rouen received its founding charter which permitted self-government. During the 12th century, Rouen was the site of a yeshiva known as La Maison Sublime. Discovered in 1976, it is now a museum. At that time, about 6,000 Jews lived in the town, comprising about 20% of the population. On 24 June 1204, King Philip II Augustus of France entered Rouen and definitively annexed Normandy to the French Kingdom. He demolished the Norman castle and replaced it with his own, the , built on the site of the Gallo-Roman amphitheatre. A textile industry developed based on wool imported from England, for which the cities of Flanders and Brabant were constantly competitors, and finding its market in the Champagne fairs. Rouen also depended for its prosperity on the river traffic of the Seine, on which it enjoyed a monopoly that reached as far upstream as Paris. In the 13th and 14th centuries, urban strife threatened the city: in 1291, the mayor was assassinated and…

Most-observed species

• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  2,261
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,045
• Eurasian Blue Tit

  Cyanistes caeruleus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,926
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,850
• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,845
• Common Chaffinch

  Fringilla coelebs Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,646
• European Robin

  Erithacus rubecula (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,559
• Carrion Crow

  Corvus corone Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,441

Most recent

• M 3 — 2008-11-19
  3 km NNW of Varengeville-sur-Mer, France
• M 3.1 — 2008-11-18
  13 km NW of Varengeville-sur-Mer, France
• M 3 — 2008-11-18
  4 km NW of Varengeville-sur-Mer, France
• M 3.1 — 2008-11-18
  13 km NW of Varengeville-sur-Mer, France
• M 3.5 — 2007-08-01
  2 km SSE of Blonville-sur-Mer, France
• M 2.6 — 2007-07-24
  15 km W of Étretat, France