Books

FRENCH LANGUAGE

From its creation under Louis XIV in 1668 to the last quarter of the 19th century, when the bastioned fortification was abandoned, the collection of relief plans bears witness to more than two centuries of siege warfare history. First of all strategically oriented, it becomes a symbol of power.
Once useful for military education, this collection is now an exceptional source of documentation for the history of architecture, urban planning and landscape. The models were executed with great precision under the direction of military engineers using very extensive graphic documentation, sometimes kept in the museum. Projects or portraits of fortified cities, the relief maps also show the development of the countryside surrounding the cities protected by their ramparts.

The Plans-Reliefs Museum now houses nearly a hundred models in Paris and Lille. Thanks to recent photographic campaigns, this book offers the reader a visit to the heart of these cities and allows him to discover the history of the collection, to know the construction and restoration techniques, to understand the documentary interest of these models.
Several maps and plans make it possible to locate the sites, in France but also in Europe. Thanks to the catalogue of the collection at the end of the book, all the relief plans of the preserved ancient forts and fortified towns are presented.

68 pages / 97 illustrations
French language