ANGERS
(Juliomagus) Maine et Loire, France.
Near an important ford on the Maine, Juliomagus is
believed to have been the original capital of the tribus
Andes, and epitomized the provincial Gallo-Roman city.
It was occupied from the 1st c. A.D. to the 4th c. and
thereafter in the Merovingian period.
In the Late Empire it acquired many public monuments, erected near the great approach roads and on the
boundary of the ancient settlement. They consist of an
amphitheater to the NE, as well as a circus, a forum,
and huge bath buildings to the SW. Towards the end of
the 3d c. a fortified rampart ca. 1000 m in circumference
was built on top of the rock overlooking the city and the
ford. Flanked by round towers, traces of which can still
be seen, the wall had two main gates to the E and a
postern gate to the W. In the 4th c. the lower city was
occupied again, as evidenced by the great polychome
geometric mosaic discovered in the Place du Ralliement.
Many objects from ancient Juliomagus are now in the
Musée Archéologique St. Jean at Angers.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. Guéry,
Angers à travers les âges, (1913); Pinier, “Deuxième note sur le rempart romain d'Angers,”
Revue del l'Anjou (1914) 5-43; G. H. Forsyth,
The Church of St Martin at Angers (1953).
M. PETIT