Originally posted on July 17, 2012 by Canicus

Musee Gallo Romain

This is what I came to Lyon to see. The area around Lyon is quite flat, except for this hill. On top of the hill is where the Gauls before Caesar had their town, which the Romans took over and made a center for the new province of Gaul. Lyon is a major city in France these days, and the hill contains a lot of “modern” structures. But there are the remains of an amphitheater and odion (a music hall) dating back to the days of Augustus Caesar.

The French have built into the side of the hill a museum. Architecturally it is interesting in itself. From the outside it is a concrete blockhouse. So plain, in fact, that the taxi driver who took me there didn’t recognize it or where the entrance is. But inside you gradually descend five floors in a spiral from the top (roughly the top of the amphitheater) to the bottom. All along the way there are displays of historical materials of Lyon going back to the stone age down to the late Roman Empire.

A lot of the material is epigraphical – inscriptions of various monuments. But there is a good deal of other things including everyday objects such as ladies’ toilet objects, game pieces, tool, weapons, pottery, glassware etc. There are also some spectacular moasics.

I’m finding Lyon a rather “normal” city after all the tourist bits in Venice, Naples and Rome. There are obviously tourists. But none of the street venders selling souvenirs. I did spot some buses that obviously are for tourists – both of the open top variety and the closed buses with big windows. In Rome you had vendors constantly attempting to sell tickets to those buses all over the place. But I can’t find any of that sort of activity here. Tomorrow, I may try again to locate one just to take a tour of the city. Or I may try to go to Vienne, which is nearby and which also has some Roman ruins. Or I may do neither.

The weather here is not what I expected. I really did think I would experience Texas like heat. But the air is on the cool side if you are in the shade. Standing in the sun, though, can be quite hot.

Canicus Modius