Auxerre is the capital (prefecture) of the Yonnedepartment and the fourth-largest city in the Burgundy historical region southeast of Paris. Auxerre’s population today is about 35,000; the urban area (aire d’attraction) comprises roughly 113,000 inhabitants. Residents of Auxerre are referred to as Auxerrois.
Auxerre is a commercial and industrial centre, with industries including food production, woodworking and batteries. It is also noted for its production of Burgundy wine, including Chablis. In 1995 Auxerre was named a “Town of Art and History“.
Auxerre was a flourishing Gallo-Roman centre, then called Autissiodorum, through which passed one of the main roads of the area, the Via Agrippa (1st century AD) which crossed the Yonne (Gallo-Roman Icauna) here. In the third century it became the seat of a bishop and a provincial capital of the Roman Empire. In the 5th century it received a cathedral. In the late 11th-early 12th century the existing communities were included inside a new line of walls built by the feudal counts of Auxerre.
Bourgeois activities accompanied the traditional land and wine cultivations starting from the twelfth century, and Auxerre developed into a commune with a Town Hall of its own. The Burgundian city, which became part of France under King Louis XI, suffered during the Hundred Years’ War and the Wars of Religion. In 1567 it was captured by the Huguenots, and many of the Catholic edifices were damaged. The medieval ramparts were demolished in the 18th century.
In the 19th century numerous heavy infrastructures were built, including a railway station, a psychiatric hospital and the courts, and new quarters were developed on the right bank of the Yonne.
Until the early 20th century, Auxerre was one of the most prosperous cities in the department. But the local authorities of that period refused the railway that was subsequently set in the village of Migennes, and signed the economic decline of the town.
