A weekend in Nimes, The Times, 5th May 2018.
With the opening of the brand new Roman museum opening in June 2018 (I was the first non-French journalist to visit), it seemed the perfect time to explore Nimes, its Roman heritage, and soak up the Mediterranean sun.
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A weekend in Nimes
The Romans may have left a legacy of magnificent aqueducts, triumphal arches and bold amphitheatres, but as I stand in the new Roman museum in the southern French town of Nîmes, it is a collection of small coloured glass jugs that leave me dumbstruck. They are extraordinary: the delicate jugs look no more than a century old, but were made 2,000 years ago and have remained intact because they were placed in sarcophagi. I wonder how few people have touched them in the two millennia since they were buried with their owners.
I’m at the new Museum of Roman History in Nîmes that is scheduled to open on June 2. Opposite the town’s incredible two-tier amphitheatre, the museum is the latest of France’s new breed of architecturally striking museums (think the Cité du Vin in Bordeaux and the Musée des Confluences in Lyons) in which light displays and projections, touchscreens and clever architecture help to showcase the exhibits. The ethereal façade of the €60 million (£53 million) museum in Nîmes, the work of the French-Brazilian architect Elizabeth de Portzamparc, is designed to resemble the folds in a Roman toga. Inside, the double-helix staircase (inspired by the one at Château de Chambord) begins the journey through the museum, in which a maze of rooms leads you deeper into Roman history.
Fun displays include a booth that projects your image back dressed in Roman clothing. Other original pieces, including theatrical masks, tombstones and mosaics that act as time machines to an era that seems altogether more recent than the time of Jesus Christ.
I later continue my Roman journey by heading for the town’s best vantage point: the top tier of the amphitheatre. The arena — the best preserved in France — was built in about AD70, when it could seat the entire population. Even today it fills to its 24,000 capacity for its Roman re-enactments and bullfights. I climb the steep steps to the top and gaze down into the perfect oval. In the distance you can spy the seven hills that surround the town, the foreground dominated by the terracotta rooftops of the old town — the buildings are packed so tightly, it’s hard to believe there are any streets.
This enchanting warren is a lovely place in which to wander, the narrow lanes home to dozens of independent clothes and homeware boutiques. I stroll on towards Nîmes’s other impressive Roman site, the Maison Carrée. Here the streets open out to the grand square, where an ornate white-pillared temple stands on a raised level. It’s the Roman Empire’s only surviving intact temple and, since the 11th century, it has been used as everything from a consular house to stables. It was blackened by pollution before its renovation, completed in 2010, but is now every bit the showpiece.
Near by is the town’s breathing space: the Jardins de la Fontaine. The ornate baroque gardens, all terraces, statues and ornamental ponds, have drawn hundreds of locals to bask in the late afternoon spring sunshine. The gardens contain the remains of the Temple de Diane and the town’s original water source. Despite the architectural fanfare, the spring proved insufficient for the town, which led to the construction of one of France’s most important Roman structures: the Pont du Gard, the 50m, three-tier aqueduct that spans the River Gardon.
The next morning I drive along plane tree-lined roads between wide open vineyards bound for this most famous of bridges. Before you see it, an excellent museum explains how its construction — thanks to 1,000 slaves a day for five years — was part of a 50km water course from Uzès to Nîmes that brought the city’s inhabitants their water.
If the Romans knew something about water, they also knew about wine. The proof is found at Mas des Tourelles, a winery set on a Roman site at Beaucaire, half an hour from Nîmes and the Pont du Gard. When the winemaker Hervé Durand took over his family’s vineyard in 1985, he discovered several shards of amphorae, the clay vessels used to transport wine, which led to the discovery of a Roman vineyard and its amphorae workshop.
Durand began researching Roman wine and, using measurements listed in historical documents, recreated an enormous wine press that includes a 7m tree trunk weighing 2,500kg, which crushes the grapes each harvest. The wine is then made according to three Roman recipes and fermented in clay pots, with herbs, spices and honey added to make it truly authentic. I taste all three and the most popular, carenum, a sweet dessert-style wine with hints of quince, proves surprisingly moreish. In Roman times the wines were transported throughout Europe in amphorae, but I wonder if — when served in the vineyards — these wines were poured from little glass jugs that would, like the wines, live on into the 21st century.
The budget hotel: Hôtel C Suites With 83 bright rooms, Hôtel C Suites has an outdoor pool and is designed along feng-shui principles. It is on the edge of town and has doubles from €73 (00 33 466 70 68 25, c-suites.fr)
The luxury hotel: Jardin Secrets
This atmospheric five-star hotel is rammed with artworks, antiques and objets d’art. It has 14 rooms, with doubles from €280; breakfast is €29 (00 33 466 84 82 64, jardinssecrets.net)
Need to know
Carolyn Boyd was a guest of the Occitanie region (tourism-occitania.co.uk), Nîmes (ot-nimes.fr), Gard (gardtourisme.com) and Atout France UK (uk.france.fr/en). She flew with Easyjet (easyjet.com) from Gatwick to Montpellier (an hour from Nîmes)
Where to eat in Nîmes
Aux Plaisir des Halles
Fresh market produce in Nîmes’ old town, with menus from €25 (£22) auxplaisirsdeshalles.com
L’Imprévu
Restaurant with a pleasant terrace on one of the city’s liveliest squares, Place d’Assas. Seafood and Italian-inspired dishes from €19. l-imprevu.com
