From Paris, visitors have only 115 km of southbound highway to go to reach Burgundy through Sens.
If they come from Lyon, they will reach the doors Burgundy in Mâcon after 70 km on the A6 highway.
They can drive up and down Burgundy from Mâcon to Sens (300 km) or from Dijon to Nevers (220 km). They can do so at their own pace, using the highway or on the contrary, strolling on the picturesque roads that criss-cross the region.

As far we can go back, Burgundy, watered by many rivers (Saône, Loire, Seine, Yonne, Bourbince and other tributaries), has always been a land of passage and exchanges between northern Europe and the Latin countries and between Central Europe and the Atlantic.
Let us just remind that it was precisely the Helvetians' crossing of the Eduen country (Burgundy) which served as a pretext for Julius Caesar to launch the war of the Gauls.

In addition to its generous river system, Burgundy enjoys a very favorable geology. At the centre, the extensive forest of the Morvan dominates the four departments of the region: Côte d'Or (Dijon), Yonne (Auxerre), Nièvre (Nevers), and Saône-et-Loire ( Macon). Outside the Morvan, limestone soils pervade the region and allow to carve stone and to grow famous vineyards. Elsewhere, the clay land is covered with rolling meadows and undulating hedged farmlands, which the white Charolais cows enjoy.

 

Above all, Burgundy invites us to encounter the civilisations that preceded us through the richness of its cultural heritage.

 

- The caves of Solutré were extensively used by hunters of the Paleolithic era. The museum Solutré presents the successive stages of prehistory and Solutrean art.

- The Celts, established all the way from Austria to Burgundy, developed a rich culture and produced a widely recognised art. The Princess of Vix's tomb, with its jewels, its many objects and its prodigious bronze crater of a capacity of 1,100 litres demonstrates the vitality of the Celts and is now the pride of the museum of Châtillon-sur-Seine.
Bibracte, on the site splendid site of the Mount Beuvray, was the capital of the Eduen Celts. Its powerful oppidum, which Julius Caesar was impressed by, now shelters the Museum of Celtic Civilization and the European Center for Archaeological Research.

- In Alésia, Caesar defeated Vercingetorix in 52 BC. This victory signed the final integration of all Gaul in the Roman Empire. The site houses the Museum of Alésia, which is currently being refurbished to become a historical complex worthy of the event.
Saint Reine, a young martyr of Alesia in the Roman times, is at the origin of the town of Alise-Sainte-Reine, a major pilgrimage site in France during the Middle Ages and up to the Revolution (particularly honoured by Anne of Austria).

- With the Romans, builders of "new towns", the Gallo-Roman civilization flourished in Autun (circuits No.1, 2 and 3), in Auxerre and Sens : fortified walls and doors, aqueducts, fountains and mosaics, temples, theatres, are now as many vestiges of the splendour of these ancient cities.

- Then, the Burgundians settled ; they gave their name to the region, their princess to the king of the Franks, and their joyful art of living to the region.

- Under Charles the Great and his descendants, Christianity developed around brilliant cultural centres as the abbeys of Flavigny and St-Germain ofAuxerre. These centres acted as a prelude to the two major movements of medieval monasticism which extended across Western Europe in the eleventh and twelfth centuries : Cluny and Cîteaux. These abbeys expanded not only as spiritual centres, but also as major intellectual, artistic and political ones, and their momentum extended throughout Europe. Gradually, "the earth was covered with a white mantle of churches" and Romanesque art pervaded all of Burgundy.

- The Middle Ages ended in Burgundy with the flamboyant reign of the Great Dukes of the West, whose pomp overshadowed that of other European courts. Burgundy at the height of its glory then extended its grip on Franche-Comte, Picardy, Artois, Flanders, Hainault, Brabant, Holland, and Luxembourg: this was the time of international Gothic art when Flemish artists came to decorate the court of Dijon, the cities of Beaune and of Autun (circuits No.1, 2 and 3), and various castles and churches.

- With the death of Charles-the-Bold, the Kingdom of Burgundy is integrated to France. The province is then administered by brilliant governors, such as the Condé the Great, cousin of the Louis XIV, whose Court in Dijon rivaled the one in Versailles. His descendants presided until the French Revolution.
Palaces gradually replaced castles: the palace of Bazoches, where Marshal Vauban designed over 300 strongholds, the palace of Bussy-Rabutin, where the cousin of Madame de Sevigné was exiled for his history of love at the court, the palace of Saint-Fargeau, in Puisaye, where the duchess of Montpensier, the « Grande Mademoiselle » fomented her intrigues, etc.

- In the nineteenth century, Burgundy actively participated in the industrial revolution : forges and steel plants in Le Creusot were developed by the Schneider family, and provided steel to the heavy industry, the rail industry, the naval industry and the armament industry.
The canals, roads and railways – including the famous railway Paris-Lyon-Marseille – multiplied and made communications and the transportation of goods easier.
Nicephore Niepce, the inventor of photography, and Etienne Jules Marey the ancestor of cinema also lived in this time of intense activity.
And Paris depended on the floating logs routed from the Morvan for its heating.
And Lamartine meditated and committed himself in the Mâconnais, and later the writer Romain Rolland became famous in Clamecy, as did Colette in Puisaye.

Pierres & Vie offers to make you discover these civilizations, these eras, these places and these people by following one of its organised tours.