When you visit a place and keep your ears and hearts open, you will find that every stone has a story to tell - a story of intrigue, valor, cruelty, love or just plain fun.
Sometimes these are true stories, sometimes they are fables and myths, sometimes they are pure fiction - flights of imagination of some creative writer but hey, it's those stories - true or not - which breath life into even the dreariest of landscapes. You only need to open your mind and ears and listen!
I was in Lyon for some work and happened to go up the hill of Fourvière - rising from the maze of lanes in the old town. While finding and losing and finding again, my way through this maze, suddenly in front of my eyes the view transformed to this (see the photo). The way old Lyon - when it was Lugdunum - looked in my most favorite epoch in history, 50BC (at least as imagined by Gosciny and Uderzo!)
50 BC is the period in which Asterix and Obelix roamed in the forests of Armorica thumping Romans and boars (the former for fun and the later for their dinner) with occasional "friendly" encounters with pirates!.
Julius Caesar had said "Veni, Vidi, Vici" after the battle of Alesia (although no one knew where that was) and declared "ALL Gaul is occupied". That caused Gosciny and Uderzo to rise in indignation and exclaim "ALL?? My dear Julius you need to go to the hydro run by the druid twins Oculusix and Spectaclix and get your oculus checked". That started the tradition that continues not just in France but in all schools all over the world - of school kids painting a pair of spectacles in their history text books, around the eyes of all those great historical figures - Whether it's Julius Caesar or Aurangzeb or Alexander (See the second photo)!
In one their Roman thumping expeditions (See "Asterix and the Banquet") our heroes go on a tour of France (Gaul) visiting various cities to collect samples of local cuisines in those cities to hold a grand banquet in their village. The city of Lugdunum is one of those important stops. This is how Lugdunum looked when Asterix and Obelisk passed through it (the first photo). And this was one the rare times when instead of thumping the Romans and collecting their helmets as trophies, Obelix leaves them lost in the maze of Old Lugdunum's unnavigable streets! The colorful language you hear in the first photo is the Roman reaction to that, essentially saying that "we would rather be thumped by Obelix, than get lost in this infernal maze"!
And this is how the remains of ancient Lugdunum look today (see 3rd and 4th photos - circa June 2011).
While walking through it I was trying to identify where the palace of prefect Poisonus Fungus must have been, where Asterix and Obelisk must have thumped the roman troops and how Jailibabix - their friend, must have got the roman garrison lost in the maze of the old Lugdunum ally-ways!
Lugdunum became one the most important cities and the provincial capital of the Roman empire in the 1st century AD. At its peak its population was estimated to be 200000. At least two future emperors of the Roman empire lived in Lugdunum - Drusus and his son Claudius (who was in fact borne there). Lugdunum became the center of political authority in the Roman provinces of Gaul and Germania, a commercial hub, and a patron of arts and artists (see the next few photos of artefacts recovered during the excavations at the site of the ancient city).
Doesn't the first of these remind you of the famous "David" by Michelangelo currently in Florence!
The present day Lyon is not as exciting as Asterix's Lugdunum of course. It's a modern French city like many other modern French cities where I had to skip three eateries (First a fast food burger joint, second a Pizza place and the third that served only coffee and pastries on a sidewalk) on a growling stomach while looking for a place to have some "French" dinner. It was an excellent dinner of course, worthy of the Lyonnaise tradition that had lured even Asterix and Obelix to travel all the way from Armorica to here to pick up local specialties for their grand feast!
The last three photos are of present day Lyon
Lyon, France June 2011
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