Saint-Étienne

Sister cities

• Oeiras
• Ben Arous
• Târgu Neamț
• Geltendorf
• Bobo-Dioulasso
• Coventry
• Wuppertal
• Katowice
• Warsaw
• Xuzhou
• Annaba
• Des Moines

History

Named after Saint Stephen, the city first appears in the historical record in the Middle Ages as (after the River Furan, a tributary of the Loire). At the close of the 12th century St Étienne was a parish of the Pays de Gier belonging to the abbey of Valbenoîte. In the 13th century, it was a small borough around the church dedicated to Saint Stephen. On the upper reaches of the Furan, near the Way of St. James, the Abbey of Valbenoîte had been founded by the Cistercians in 1222. At the beginning of the 15th century Charles VII permitted the town to erect fortifications. In the first half of the 19th century, it was only a chief town of an arrondissement in the ' of the Loire, with a population of 33,064 in 1832. The concentration of industry prompted these numbers to rise rapidly to 110,000 by about 1880. It was this growing importance of Saint-Étienne that led to its being made seat of the prefecture and the departmental administration on 25 July 1855, when it became the chief town in the ' and seat of the prefect, replacing Montbrison, which was reduced to the status of chief town of an . Saint-Étienne absorbed the commune of Valbenoîte and several other neighbouring localities on 31 March 1855. During the repression of January and February 1894, the police conducted raids targeting the anarchists living there, without much success.

Most-observed species

• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,501
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,500
• Eurasian Blue Tit

  Cyanistes caeruleus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,233
• European Robin

  Erithacus rubecula (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,131
• Common Chaffinch

  Fringilla coelebs Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,068
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  801
• European Goldfinch

  Carduelis carduelis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  799
• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  777

Most recent

• M 4.8 — 2019-11-11
  5 km WNW of Rochemaure, France
• M 2.7 — 2008-08-18
  7 km W of Langeac, France
• M 2.7 — 2008-08-18
  7 km W of Langeac, France
• M 2.8 — 2008-05-04
  6 km NE of Brioude, France
• M 2.6 — 2008-01-24
  7 km S of Le Cheylard, France
• M 2.5 — 2008-01-22
  4 km NW of Cruas, France