Paris - Sorbonne - 5me

Plate XLV - The Church of the Sorbonne…

Practically across the road from the Panthéon is (part of) the University of Paris. Whatever French I speak today, I owe in some measure to the ‘Sorbonne’*. My first French teacher, you see, did her post graduate language studies here in Paris - and you can’t get much better than that! Of course it meant that I learned the purest form of the language and even today I am told that I have the accent of a Suisse Romande. I guess that’s good?

Originally a theological college founded in 1257 by Robert de Sorbon, confessor to Louis IX, the College of the Sorbonne became the greatest seat of learning in Europe, and the centre of the University of Paris - with a claimed enrolment of some twenty thousand students as far back as the Renaissance age. The domed Church of the Sorbonne, added in 1637 contains the tomb of Cardinal Richelieu, both benefactor and sponsor of the college.  It was suppressed during the Revolution, restored by Napoleon in 1808, and was closed in 1882.  A secular institution since then, the present buildings of the university were completed in 1889. Marie Curie - the first woman Nobel Prize winner - also became the first woman professor at the University in 1908. The Curie Institute, still involved in teaching and research is in close proximity.

The University became a centre of world attention in May 1968 when it was occupied by student radicals during violent protests that spread throughout the Latin quarter of the city - evacuated by order of President Georges Pompidou. Later called the ‘events of May’ this civil unrest would lead to the political demise of General de Gaulle, and to widespread educational reforms.

*Although comprising of a number of colleges, the Universities of Paris today are familiarly referred to collectively as The Sorbonne.