Neptune's Needle

City (1990 pop. 105,470), (cap.) Seine-Maritime dept. and Haute-Normandie administrative region, 70 mi/113 km NW of Paris, c.75 mi/121 km above Le Havre; 49º30'N 01º00'E. Situated on both banks of the Seine (which here flows in a great N-pointing bend), Rouen functions as the outport of Paris, handling an enormous volume of export and import cargo along its 7 mi/11.3 km of port facilities, and serving as a transshipment point bet. river barges and seagoing vessels. Rouen has long been an important industrial center (metalworks, textile mfg., chemical and food-processing plants) whose prods. are closely related to its port activities (traffic in hydrocarbons, cereals, imported raw materials form the tropics). While Rouen’s pop. has been static, the city’s suburbs have grown in all directions, esp. within the great river bend, so that the metropolitan area’s pop. exceeds 380,000. The main suburbs are Le Petit-Quevilly (1990 pop. 22,609) and Le Grand-Quevilly (1990 pop. 27,653), Petit-Couronne (1993 est. pop. 8,122) and Grand-Couronne (1993 est. pop. 9,795), all on the left bank of the Seine downriver from the city (port area, oil depots, factories); Sotteville-l’s-Rouen (1990 pop. 29,554), Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray (1990 pop. 30,733), and Oissel (1990 pop. 11,453), all on the left bank, inside the bend and upstream from Rouen; the SE suburbs of Bonsecours (1993 est. pop. 6,897) and Franqueville-Saint-Pierre (1993 est. pop. 4,229), in a rapidly growing area near the airport at Boes; the NW suburbs of Canteleu (1990 pop. 16,093), Daville-lls-Rouen (1990 pop. 10,519), Mont-Saint-Agnan (1990 pop. 19,959), Notre-Dame-de-Bondeville (1993 est. pop. 7,588), and Bois-Guillaume (1990 pop. 10,162). Rouen does not have a peripheral expressway, but radial highways leave the city in all directions, and the Paris-Normandy expressway skirts the metropolitan area on the S. Of pre-Roman origin, Rouen was the victim of repeated raids (9th cent.) by the Norsemen. By the 10th cent. it was the capital of Normandy and a leading Eur. port city. It was held by the English (1419-1449) in the Hundred Years War. Joan of Arc was tried and burned at the stake here in 1431. Bet. the end of the 15th cent. and the Fr. Revolution, Rouen was, with interruptions, the seat of a provincial parliament. A judicial center, it furnished many magistrates to France. Rouen has been an archiepiscopal see since the 5th cent. and is particularly rich in ecclesiastical bldgs. It suffered severe damage in World War II; its port and much of the city had to be rebuilt. Damaged, but since restored, are the Gothic cathedral of Notre Dame (12th-15th cent.) with its famous Tour de Beurre [Fr.=butter tower]; the Churches of St. Ouen (14th-cent. and 16th-cent. stained glass windows) and of St. Maclou (Flamboyant Gothic); the palace of justice (15th-16th cent.); and the Gros-Horloge, a Renaissance clock tower, which is at the heart of the old town and a principal tourist gathering place. The houses where Pierre Corneille and Gustave Flaubert were born are both mus. The univ. has grown rapidly since its establishment in 1966. Rouen also has a recently restored fine arts mus. and mus. exhibiting ceramics, old ironwork, and regional antiquities.

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Compiler

Peter Richards