Between 250 and 225 BCE, the Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, settled on the banks of the Seine, built bridges and a fort, minted coins, and began to trade with other river settlements in Europe. In 52 BCE, a Roman army led by Titus Labienus defeated the Parisii and established a Gallo-Roman garrison town called Lutetia. The town was Christianised in the 3rd century CE, and after the collapse of the Roman Empire, it was occupied by Clovis I, the King of the Franks, who made it his capital in 508. During the Middle Ages, Paris was the largest city in Europe, an important religious and commercial centre, and the birthplace of the Gothic style of architecture. The University of Paris on the Left Bank, organised in the mid-13th century, was one of the first in Europe. It suffered from the Bubonic Plague in the 14th century and the <a href="https://history-maps.com/story/Hundred-Years-War" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Hundred Years' War</a> in the 15th century, with recurrence of the plague. Between 1418 and 1436, the city was occupied by the Burgundians and English soldiers. In the 16th century, Paris became the book-publishing capital of Europe, though it was shaken by the French Wars of Religion between Catholics and Protestants. In the 18th century, Paris was the centre of the intellectual ferment known as the Enlightenment, and the main stage of the French Revolution from 1789, which is remembered every year on the 14th of July with a military parade. In the 19th century, Napoleon embellished the city with monuments to military glory. It became the European capital of fashion and the scene of two more revolutions (in 1830 and 1848). Under Napoleon III and his Prefect of the Seine, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, the centre of Paris was rebuilt between 1852 and 1870 with wide new avenues, squares and new parks, and the city was expanded to its present limits in 1860. In the latter part of the century, millions of tourists came to see the Paris International Expositions and the new Eiffel Tower. In the 20th century, Paris suffered bombardment in World War I and <a href="https://history-maps.com/story/History-of-Germany" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">German occupation</a> from 1940 until 1944 in World War II. Between the two wars, Paris was the capital of modern art and a magnet for intellectuals, writers and artists from around the world. The population reached its historic high of 2.1 million in 1921, but declined for the rest of the century. New museums (The Centre Pompidou, Musée Marmottan Monet and Musée d'Orsay) were opened, and the Louvre given its glass pyramid.

Visual Timelines

History of Paris Timeline

History of Paris Timeline

Parisii

Lutetia founded

Saint Denis

Saint Genevieve

Clovis I makes Paris his capital

Viking Siege of Paris

Capetians

Birth of the Gothic style

University of Paris

Paris in the Middle Ages

Paving of Paris

Louvre Fortress

Le Marais begins

Work regulated by clocks

Pont-au-Change

Black Death arrives in Paris

Paris under English

Paris recaptured

Construction begins of the Hôtel de Cluny

Renaissance arrives in Paris

Paris under Francis I

Paris under Henry II

Regency of Catherine de Medici

Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre

Paris under Henry IV

Siege of Paris

Paris under Louis XIII

Paris under Louis XIV

Age of Enlightenment

Paris under Louis XV

French Revolution

Paris under Napoleon

Paris during the Bourbon Restoration

Paris under Louis-Philippe

Paris during the Second Empire

Paris Universal Expositions

Paris in the Belle Époque

Paris Commune

Paris in World War I

Paris between the Wars

Paris in World War II

Paris Post-war

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