Ile de la Cité, Place Dauphine

PLACE DAUPHINE History

   In the XVI-th century, the arms of the Seine between the little islands situated below the palace of the Cité were filled, the ground itself was higher, and an embankment was built along the left arm of the river. This embankment was later called “Quai des Orfèvres” because of the presence of the goldsmiths. Thus a new place was ready for urbanistic works.

   At the beginning, this new area was used for the warehousing of the materials intended for the building of the Pont-Neuf, which was ended in 1606 under Henri IV. One year later, the king ordered to heighten the level of the concerned area and to build very high bricked up embankments in order to protect the whole place. Then it was decided to build a new district which would benefit from one the most enviable positions in Paris.

   The place and the street Dauphine were so called in honour of the Dauphin, the futur Louis the XIII-th, heir of the french crown and son of Henri IV and Mary of Medici.

   The place is the work of the architects Louis Métézeau and Jacques Androuet du Cerceau as well as the topographer engineer Claude Chastillon.

   The buildings, all similar one to the other, except the ones in the angles of the place, were build on plots of  equal erae, along the Quai des Orfèvres with 28 houses, the street of Harlay with 8 houses and the Quai de l’Horloge with 24 houses. On the east side of the street of Harlay a row of 31 symmetrical buildings was leaned against the surrounding walls of the palce.

   It is hard today to realise how this place harmonious was. The place Dauphine indeed is one of the first model of the parisian places. It was ended a few years after the Place royal, today called place des Vosges, achieved in 1612.

   Because of the death of Henri IV-th in 1610, the place was not totally achieved in 1620.

   Until Napoleon III-rd, the place Dauphine  preserved its homogeneous character. Between 1856 and 1867, the architect Duc rebuilt the west side of the courthouse. The houses in the street of Harlay, which hid the great façade of the Supreme Court of Appeal, were distroyed because of their decrepitude.  

   Under the Commune of 1871, the fires destroyed the last houses in the street of Harlay.