Two Thousand Years Geneva

9 September 2022

Geneva is more than a city of diplomacy, international organisations, markets, banks, the watch industry, and the lake’s fountain.

It was the first territory conquered and governed by the Romans (120 B.C.) in present-day Switzerland, one of the country’s first bishoprics, the capital of Calvinism, an independent republic until it was annexed by Napoleon in 1798 and incorporated into the Swiss Confederation in 1815. In short, a city with a millennia-old past and an interesting and varied (cultural) present.

Le Sentier culturel Vielle-Ville (The cultural path of the old town) traces two thousand years of history by an architectural, cultural and historical trail:

The Roman period and Christianity (the archaeological site of St Peter’s Cathedral);
The kings of Burgundy, the Merovingians and Carolingians, the county, the bishopric, the city, and the canton of Geneva (since 1815), the dukes of Savoy, and the famous Escalade, the Reformation, and the Musée de la Réforme.

The Roman period

The Burgundian King

The City Hall, the seat of the cantonal and municipal political for more than half a millennium, the Place du Bourg-de-Four, the birthplace of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Maison Tavel, the Museum of the Zoubov Foundation, the Barbier-Mueller Museum, Jean Calvin’s house (the house he lived in was demolished in 1706 and replaced by the current building).

The Saint-Antoine Bastion, the Lutheran Church, the Baudet Tower, the Old Arsenal, the Reformers’ Wall, the Temple of Fustery, the Temple of Madeleine, the Abbey Foundation, the Museum of Art and History, the Graphic Arts Cabinet, and many ancient streets and squares. Et encore le Bastion Saint-Antoine, l’Église luthérienne and la tour Baudet.