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Florac is a former commune of the
Lozère Lozère (; ) is a landlocked Departments of France, department in the Regions of France, region of Occitania (administrative region), Occitanie in Southern France, located near the Massif Central, bounded to the northeast by Haute-Loire, to the ...
department in southern France. On 1 January 2016, it was merged into the new commune of Florac-Trois-Rivières.


History


Medieval

Raymond of Anduze held the barony of Florac and is recorded as using the castle there in the 13th century. In 1363 local-born Pope Urban V lent the town 300 florins for the construction of ramparts. Such defences were not at all unusual and offered desirable security and protection for the townspeople. These medieval city walls finally came down in 1629 after the Edict of Alès which, despite allowing some concessions for Huguenots, insisted on the pulling down of fortifications at perceived 'strongholds'.


19th century

Florac was visited by a young
Robert Louis Stevenson Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as ''Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll ...
and features as a chapter in his droll Victorian bestseller '' Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes'' (1879). The Robert Louis Stevenson Trail (GR 70), a popular long-distance path following Stevenson's approximate route, runs through the town. The nearby Mont Lozère is a ski resort.


Historic buildings


Ecclesiastical

The
French Wars of Religion The French Wars of Religion were a series of civil wars between French Catholic Church, Catholics and Protestantism, Protestants (called Huguenots) from 1562 to 1598. Between two and four million people died from violence, famine or disease di ...
resulted in the destruction of Florac's medieval Catholic church in 1561 and some time after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, Florac's first Protestant church was also razed. Today there are two fairly large churches on the respective sites of the older structures. The Protestant church has a historical information plaque bearing the date 1832, while higher up the hill towards Causse Méjean the Catholic Saint-Martin's bears the date 1833.


Eglise Reformée de France (1832)

The Protestant church is at the end of the Esplanade, beneath Place de Souvenir (Remembrance Square). The first Protestant church on this site was destroyed after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). The present church was built by public subscription over a number of years after 1825, reaching completion in 1832. In 2011 there was a major restoration project under local architect Francois Coulomb, with the result that the interior today provides a stunning example of the ideals of the first builders. The exterior is simple neo-classical. The stone is covered in the plain dun render common to other buildings on the esplanade. There is a small bell house on top. The overall shape is neatly echoed in a modest portico of two Roman Tuscan columns, an entablature bearing the name and a simple unadorned pediment. The dominant note of the interior is light. Firstly, the walls and columns are panelled in whitewashed pine, giving a slightly New England flavour. Mostly, though, the effect of the determined simplicity is pre-Christian Roman. The only explicitly Christian decoration is the legend "Dieu est amour" painted at the 'West' end. There is a sense of civic virtue and pride in the colonnaded balconies which are a deliberate invocation of public space in Roman architecture. The space is regularly used today for services and classical music concerts.


St Martin's Catholic Church (1833)

A neo-classical temple, the deliberately imposing west facade has a high Roman Doric portico, with unfluted columns, unrendered stone and an unadorned entablature and pediment, contrasting with the modest wooden doors, stained a very dark brown. There is a plaque commemorating local-born Guillaume de Grimoard who rose to pope as Urban V (1363–70). At the front of the drive is an iron cross dated 1841. Both north and south facades are extremely plain. The stained glass windows are protected by iron grills and reinforced glass which is frosting. There is a tower at the East end. The dark interior means the stained glass stands out. Otherwise, it is comparatively plain, with are stone walls, very likely to be reused stone from an earlier structure. There is a doorway to the vestry behind altar, and simple geometric transom glass. Against the West end wall (North side) is a very fine statue of Christ. There are two fonts: one is neoclassical black and grey marble; the second looks more like polished limestone and is standing incongruously on what looks like the base to a no-longer-existing column, very probably belonging to the former structure.


Military

A good deal of military action has taken place in and around Florac. Before 1629 the town retained a defensive wall, and the castle was used by the Barons of Anduze in the 13th century.


Château de Florac


Twin towns

Florac is twinned with: * L'Anse-Saint-Jean, Quebec,
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
since 1984 * Arbucies,
Catalonia Catalonia is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationalities and regions of Spain, nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia of 2006, Statute of Autonomy. Most of its territory (except the Val d'Aran) is situate ...
,
Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...
since 1987


See also

* Causse Méjean


References


External links


Florac official siteFlorac in Lozere
(separate texts in French, English, Dutch and German; photographs) {{authority control Former communes of Lozère