Montmartre Totally Explained

Everything about Montmartre totally explained

Montmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, and also the name of the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank, primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district. The other, older, church on the hill is Saint Pierre de Montmartre, which claims to be the location at which the Jesuit order of priests was founded. Many artists had studios or worked around the community of Montmartre such as Salvador Dalí, Claude Monet, Pablo Picasso and Vincent van Gogh.

Name origin

The toponym Mons Martis ("Mount of Mars") survived into Merovingian times, Christianised as Montmartre, signifying 'mountain of the martyr'; it owes this name to the martyrdom of Saint Denis, who was decapitated on the hill around 250 AD. Saint Denis was the Bishop of Paris and is the patron saint of France.
The hill's religious symbolism is thought to be even older, as it has been suggested as a likely druidic holy place because it's the highest point in the area. No archeological evidence supports the claim.

19th century

When Napoleon III and his city planner Baron Haussmann planned to make Paris the most beautiful city in Europe, a first step was to grant large sweeps of land near the center of the city to Haussmann's friends and financial supporters. This drove the original inhabitants to the edges of the city — to the districts of Clichy, La Villette, and the hill with a view of the city, Montmartre.
Russians occupied Montmartre when invading Paris. They used the altitude of the hill for artillery bombardment of the city. There is a memorial sign on one of the restaurants on Montmartre that says: On 30 March 1814 - here the Cossacks first launched their famous "Bistro" and thus on this summit occurred the worthy ancestor of our Bistros.

LE 30 MARS 1814
LES COSAQUES LANCERENT ICI
EN PREMIER, LEUR TRES FAMEUX "BISTRO"
ET, SUR LA BUTTE, NAQUIT AINSI
LE DIGNE ANCÉTRE DE NOS BISTROTS.
180^eme ANNIVERSAIRE
SYNDICAT D'INTIATIVE DU VIEUX MONTMARTRE

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   Since Montmartre was outside the city limits, free of Paris taxes and no doubt also due to the fact that the local nuns made wine, the hill quickly became a popular drinking area. The area developed into a center of free-wheeling and decadent entertainment at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. In the popular cabaret the Moulin Rouge, and at Le Chat Noir, artists, singers and performers regularly appeared including Yvette Guilbert, Marcelle Lender, Aristide Bruant, La Goulue, Georges Guibourg, Mistinguett, Fréhel, Jane Avril, Damia and others.
   The Basilica of the Sacré Cœur was built on Montmartre from 1876 to 1912 by public subscription as a gesture of expiation after the defeat of 1871 in the Franco-Prussian War. Its white dome is a highly visible landmark in the city, and just below it artists still set up their easels each day amidst the tables and colorful umbrellas of Place du Tertre.
   At the beginning of his political career, the future French statesman Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929) was mayor of Montmartre.

Artists gather

In the mid-1800s artists, such as Johan Jongkind and Camille Pissarro, came to inhabit Montmartre. By the end of the century, Montmartre and its counterpart on the Left Bank, Montparnasse, became the principal artistic centers of Paris. A restaurant opened near the old windmill near the top, the Moulin de la Galette. Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, and other impoverished artists lived and worked in a commune, a building called Le Bateau-Lavoir during the years 1904–1909.
   Artist associations such as Les Nabis and the Incoherents were formed and individuals including Vincent van Gogh, Pierre Brissaud, Alfred Jarry, Gen Paul, Jacques Villon, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, Henri Matisse, André Derain, Suzanne Valadon, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Maurice Utrillo, Toulouse-Lautrec, Théophile Steinlen, and African-American "expatriates" such as Langston Hughes worked in Montmartre and drew some of their inspiration from the area.
   Composers, including Satie (who was a pianist at Le Chat Noir), also lived in the area.
   The last of the bohemian Montmartre artists was Gen Paul (1895–1975), born in Montmartre and a friend of Utrillo, Paul's calligraphic expressionist lithographs, sometimes memorializing picturesque Montmartre itself, owe a lot to Raoul Dufy.

Contemporary Montmartre

In La Bohème (1965), perhaps the best-known song by popular singer-songwriter Charles Aznavour, a painter recalls his youthful years in a Montmartre that has ceased to exist: Je ne reconnais plus/Ni les murs, ni les rues/Qui ont vu ma jeunesse/En haut d'un escalier/Je cherche l'atelier/Dont plus rien ne subsiste/Dans son nouveau décor/Montmartre semble triste/Et les lilas sont morts ('I no longer recognize/Neither the walls nor the streets/That had seen my youth/At the top of a staircase/I look for an atelier/Of which nothing survives/In its new décor/Montmartre seems sad/And the lilacs are dead'). The song is a farewell to what, according to Aznavour, were the last days of Montmartre as a site of bohemian activity.
   The Dubstar song La Bohème, released as a filler track for the single "No More Talk", from the album Goodbye is remake of the French song in English, also as a wistful recollection of young adulthood spent in the Montmartre area.
   The Musée de Montmartre is in the house where the painter Maurice Utrillo lived and worked in a second-floor studio. The mansion in the garden at the back is the oldest hotel on Montmartre, and one of its first owners was Claude Roze, also known as Roze de Rosimond, who bought it in 1680. Roze was the actor, who replaced Molière, and, like his predecessor, died on stage. The house was Pierre-Auguste Renoir's first Montmartre address and many other names moved through the premises.
   Just off the top of the butte, Espace Dalí showcases surrealist artist Salvador Dalí's work. Nearby, day and night, tourists visit such sights as the artists in Place du Tertre and the cabaret du Lapin Agile. Many renowned artists are buried in the Cimetière de Montmartre and the Cimetière Saint-Vincent.
   The movie Amélie is set in an exaggeratedly quaint version of contemporary Montmartre.
   Montmartre is an officially designated historic district with limited development allowed in order to maintain its historic character.
   A funicular railway, the Funiculaire de Montmartre, operated by RATP, ascends the hill from the south while the Montmartre Bus circles the hill.
   Downhill to the southwest is the red-light district of Pigalle. That area is, today, largely known for a wide variety of sex shops and prostitutes. It also contains a great number of stores specializing in instruments for rock music. There are also several concert halls, also used for rock music.

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