The late A.A. Gill once wrote a memorable article about Ravenna describing it as one of his “brilliant places to visit because everyone else is looking the other way.” Oldgreytravel is keen on this kind of alternative tourism as mentioned in his post on Ghent (October 2018).
Troyes, set in the heart of the Champagne district of France must surely qualify as one of Gill’s brilliant places. Its good fortune must be that it is not near anywhere else of great interest. It is quite a journey to reach and its attractions are probably not going to detain you for more than a weekend at most. Oldgreytravel stopped off for a day while returning from a visit to the Alps.
In a nutshell, Troyes is one of the best preserved and finest medieval timber-framed cities in France. It has some of the finest stained glass in Europe and one of the best museums dedicated to this medieval craft. An exceptionally fine Museum of Art, numerous churches and Abbeys including St Jean-au-Marche, where Henry V married Catherine of France in 1420. The city was memorably recaptured from the English by Joan of Arc in 1429, starting the reversal of English fortunes in France that were to lead to the eventual demise of English influence on the Continent.
Of course, half the fun is just wandering the narrow, winding streets of the old town enjoying the relative lack of fellow tourists and watching a small French provincial city go about its business. One of the oddities of Troyes is that most of the medieval buildings are relatively late C16 rebuilds of the earlier medieval city. A series of extensive fires culminated in the great inferno of 1524 when most of the old city was destroyed. Surveying the ashes, the city fathers vowed to rebuild in the original, though by then somewhat archaic, timber-framed style of the middle ages. Fireproof stone was used for the most prestigious buildings but the great majority of the city was rebuilt in traditional timber-framed structures. It is the glorious completeness of Troyes’ medieval centre that makes it special – like Bruges but without the crowds.
The other great conundrum about Troyes is how this fragile and highly flammable city survived two world wars without being flattened or burnt to ashes. The first of the great conflagrations did not intrude close enough to endanger the city, but it is intriguing how it managed to survive the manic destruction that the Second World War visited on so many French cities. The answer is twofold – one, it did not fall in any major strategic gaps or defensive lines and two, partly no doubt because of this, it was designated as a hospital town first by the Germans and then by the Allies. Amazingly, despite the horror and ferocity of that conflict both sides respected the almost feudal chivalry of this arrangement and the city was never bombed or shelled.
For this, today’s traveller (and the citizens of Troyes) have the good fortune to be able to enjoy the spectacle of a late medieval city, still a working city rather than a petrified monument to the past, and what must be one of the most entertaining and relaxed tourist destinations in France – and you will have the place pretty much to yourself too.
