CONDEVICNUM
(Nantes) Loire-Atlantique, France.
There are few traces of the port of Condevicnum, and no substructures have been found in situ. The city, however, had some public and religious buildings, judging from the many architectural fragments discovered here. One of these is a dedicatory inscription, now
in the Hôtel de Ville, which mentions that Nantes had a
corps of boatmen, the Nautae Ligerici.
At the end of the 3d c. A.D. a rampart with round towers was erected around the city, some sections of which can be seen near the cathedral. The lower courses of one of the city gates, the Porte St. Pierre, uncovered at the
beginning of this century, are also visible today. The collections of the Musée Dobré in Nantes include a good many objects from ancient Condevicaum.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Durville, “Fouilles de l'Evêché de
Nantes,”
BAC (1912); P. Caillaud et al.,
Nantes, son
Histoire, sa Marine, ses Monuments (1958).
M. PETIT
