Tarascon

• The station:

Tarasque of the Fifties represented on the entry of the station is a copy of that which one can admire on the armorial bearings of the city in XV century.

• Municipal theatre:

The frontage of the theatre, rebuilt in 1885, has a very beautiful high blazon colors: Tarasque is illustrated there with a green body and a gold carapace on a rosy overall bottom.

• Library:

Blazon (carries giving on the Itam boulevard): this blazon is a copy of the blazon of the city of XV century, on which Tarasque devours an young man. The sextupédie of monster appears in the descriptions provided to XIIIème century by the Dominican scientist Vincent from Beauvais and in the text apocryphal book of XII century “life of holy Marthe”, by Synthique. This blazon was carved by tarasconnais Jean-Barnabe Amy (frontage of the theatre) for the old water tower of Tarascon

• Town hall:

Frontage: the Town hall, built in 1648, is decorated on its frontage with a statue with holy Marthe embanking Tarasque, works of the sculptor tarasconnais Louis the Male. The choice of perhaps consuls (former municipal officers) carried on a religious, rare iconography for a civil building, justifies themselves by the gifts of reception of Marthe, considered by the Church as “hostess of Christ”.

• Castle of King Rene:

Apartment of the lady-in-waitings (side court, interior of the castle): on the ceiling of the apartment is painted Tarasque with six legs, which decorates the fabulous decoration bestiary part.

• Place Général de Gaulle

This statue, installed on the place de Gaulle General in June 2005, is most recent representation of Tarasque. The animal was cut in a block of stone of 25 tons coming from the careers of Oppède, by the sculptor tarasconnais Pascal Demomont. Tarasque has six legs finished by claws of bear, a barded grotesque head of an interminable line of teeth and a finished tail of a pivot.

This strolls takes along you in the middle of the old city to discover the most beautiful monuments of Tarascon.

Royal residence of the counts angevins until XV century, Tarascon has majestic buildings, such as the castle of King Rene, dominating the Rhone, or the collegial Saint-Marthe, where the tomb of holy (IV century) is preserved.

Protected formerly by its enclosure, whose three doors remain today, the city was divided with the Middle Ages into eight trowels or districts, of which a juivery and a shopping area (place of the Market, street of the Markets), which knew to preserve their picturesque character.

After having gone along the boulevard Itam, name of a famous officer of cavalry, you will pass in front of a beautiful residence to the 55 (a) which sheltered the House of Tartarin hitherto.

This ambulation in the oldest districts of the city will enable you to admire the buildings of the Souleïado factory today transformed into museum of fabric of Provence, the theatre, the law courts or the cloister of Cordeliers, ultimate pilot reappearing of the monastic presence with Tarascon.

• Church Sainte-Marthe
• Château du Roi René
• Old district of Juiverie
• Town hall
• Place Market - street of the Markets
• Old convent of the Ursulines (Black and white place)
• The Souleïado museum
• The Court
• The cloister of Cordeliers - Space TARTARIN

The prosperity of the town of Tarascon is at the origin of the installation of many noble families as of XV century. Aristocrats, middle-class man, tradesmen, or monks make raise splendid particular residences, anxious to impose their print in the urban landscape.

Thanks to the richness of their external ornamentation, the frontages of these hotels testify to a variety of individual solutions, relayed at the beginning of the XVII century by the splendid expression of the Mannerism of Provence, period ostentation of architecture in Provence.

Around the collegial Saint-Marthe to the commercial street of the Markets or in the old districts of Saint Martin and of Condamine, formerly connecting the castle to the road of Avignon, these civil buildings generally occupied a strategic place within the city.

• Hotel of Sade-Cadillan, XVI century - XVIII century
• Hotel of Clerk of Molières, XVII century - XVIII century
• Hotel of Lubière-Ayminy, XIIIème century - XVIII century
• Hotel of Léautaud of Farmhouse-White, XV century - XVIII century
• Hotel of the Mound, XV century-XIXècentury
• Hotel of Fat of Preigne, XVII century-XIX century
• Hotel of Laudun, medium XV century - XVIII century

All starts by the market, an institution in Provence. Quite simply impossible to circumvent! It rate/rhythm the week. Convivial place of meetings and discoveries, the market of Provence is an enchantment of the directions. The wines of Provence to the cordial personality, rosy fruity, headier reds côtoient the green or ripe olive oils, the fougasses with anise or oil the pumps, the aromatized cheeses of thyme or rosemary… Candied fruits, calissons or “Bésuquettes” (tasty chocolate praline-flavoured ice cream button worked with the image of Tarasque) are tasted under the olive-trees accompanied by some mouthfuls of the Elixir of the Left-handed, divine Father and powerful beverage describes by Alphonse Daudet in the Letters of my Mill. In the course of the stalls, the scents enivrantes of the plants and aromatic herbs mix with the colors with the fruits and vegetables in an unceasingly renewed kaleidoscope.

The sunny accent of people of the South still adds to the marvellous pleasure of melting itself in an entire world dedicated to the love of life. Each week, Tarascon installs its market under the plane trees of its Course.

You will discover the gasoline of the gastronomy of Provence there, impressed freshness and perfumes, the authenticity of a soil and the diversity of the products of Provence.