department
Department may refer to:
* Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility
Government and military
*Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...
Saint-Germain-lès-Arlay
Saint-Germain-lès-Arlay (, literally ''Saint-Germain near Arlay'') is a former commune in the Jura department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in eastern France. On 1 January 2016, it was merged into the commune of Arlay.Salt Road" forded the river Seille. It was refounded by the Romans as an '' oppidum'' and functioned as a Gallo-Roman city until it was repeatedly laid waste from the third to the fifth century in the
barbarian invasions
The Migration Period was a period in European history marked by large-scale migrations that saw the fall of the Western Roman Empire and subsequent settlement of its former territories by various tribes, and the establishment of the post-Roman ...
. The presence of
Burgundians
The Burgundians ( la, Burgundes, Burgundiōnes, Burgundī; on, Burgundar; ang, Burgendas; grc-gre, Βούργουνδοι) were an early Germanic tribe or group of tribes. They appeared in the middle Rhine region, near the Roman Empire, and ...
at the site is testified to by their tombs.
Waldalenus Waldalenus, or Wandalenus (late 6th – early 7th century), ''dux'' in the region between the Alps and the Jura, in the Frankish Kingdom of Burgundy, was a Frankish magnate who served as mayor of the Austrasian palace at Metz from 581, during the ...
, Patrician of Burgundy, had his ''
palatium
The Palatine Hill (; la, Collis Palatium or Mons Palatinus; it, Palatino ), which relative to the seven hills of Rome is the centremost, is one of the most ancient parts of the city and has been called "the first nucleus of the Roman Empire." ...
'' here at the end of the sixth century, and his son, Donatus, abbot of Luxeuil, established a monastery here, dedicated to Saint Vincent; the abbey church was noted in 654. A hospital associated with the abbey was in existence in the twelfth century.
In the thirteenth century the barony of Arlay, on the borders with the Bresse region, passed into the dynasty of the counts of Châlons, the preeminent noblemen in the south of the Franche-Comté. They controlled the exploitation of salt mined at Salins. Their heirs became Princes of Orange in the early fifteenth century, when Jean III de Chalon-Arlay married the heiress of the Principality of Orange; the title ''baron of Arlay'' is still held by Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands.
The castle of Arlay, rebuilt in stone in the ninth to eleventh centuries, was attacked by the French forces of Louis XI and of Henri IV and was fully destroyed in 1637 by troops of Louis XIII; though the ''château-fort'' was reduced to ruins, Arlay and the Franche-Comté did not definitively become French until 1674.
Population
Vineyards
The vineyards that surround the ruins of the castle are among the oldest continuously-worked vineyards of France, though the label ''Château d'Arlay'' ( Côtes du Jura AOC), on 30 hectares (74 acres) was only established in 1960, by comte R. de Laguiche.
Château d'Arlay
The eighteenth-century Château d'Arlay was built by the comtesse de Lauraguais, c 1770-80, on the former site of the convent of the ''Minimes'' near the foot of the small eminence occupied by the ''château-fort''. Its contents were dispersed at the French Revolution and Mme de Lauraguais died under the guillotine in 1794, but in 1825 the property was assumed by prince Pierre d’Arenberg, grandson of Mme de Lauraguais, who refurnished it with the classical furniture in pale veneers and fruitwoods (''bois clair'') characteristic of the reign of Charles X, which remain in the house today; in addition to its interior decor, it preserves remains of its park and modern flower gardens.
The caves called the ''Grottes de Saint-Vincent''See Christianised sites. contain marks of human presence in the Upper
Paleolithic
The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (), also called the Old Stone Age (from Greek: παλαιός ''palaios'', "old" and λίθος ''lithos'', "stone"), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone too ...
Magdalenian
The Magdalenian cultures (also Madelenian; French: ''Magdalénien'') are later cultures of the Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic in western Europe. They date from around 17,000 to 12,000 years ago. It is named after the type site of La Madele ...