Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The ramparts of Saint-Paul-de-Vence were built in the 16th century to strengthen the city's defence against the repeated invasions of Charles Quint in Provence. In 1524 and 1536, the region suffered imperial attacks, revealing the vulnerability of existing medieval fortifications. As early as 1537, the inhabitants manned the mercenary Rozato Melino Romain to repair the walls, while Francis I, after a visit in 1538, decided to transform Saint Paul into a royal fortress. The Fontainebleau Order (August 1537) grants privileges to the city, marking the beginning of an ambitious project.

The systematic fortification was launched after the Battle of Cerisoles (1544), a French victory in which Saint Paul's troops participated. François I entrusted the plans to Jean de Renaud (known as Saint-Rémy), a military engineer from Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, who designed a modern bastioned enclosure. The works, started in 1544, involve the destruction of dozens of houses and mobilize hundreds of workers carrying stones since La Sine's quarry. When François I died in 1547, the construction site remained unfinished: there were no cords and parapets.

In the 17th century, Vauban criticized the "bad design" of the ramparts, proposing improvements via his assistant Antoine Niquet (project of 1705). Repairs are made after the imperial siege of 1707, but the square loses its strategic interest with the construction of the fortifications of Antibes. Declassified under the First Empire, the enclosure was bought by the municipality in 1872. Despite later breakthroughs (1910, 1985), it remains a rare example in France of Renaissance bastioned architecture, classified as a historical monument in 1945.

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