Saone-et-Loire: Cluny, Burgundy Wine, and Industrial History
Saone-et-Loire is the largest department in Burgundy and contains some of the most important sites of medieval Christendom. Cluny's abbey, founded in 910, was the largest church in the world until Saint Peter's Basilica was rebuilt in Rome. Autun preserves Roman gates and a Romanesque cathedral. Chalon-sur-Saone claims to be the birthplace of photography, as Nicephore Niepce made the first permanent photograph nearby in 1826.
Macon, the prefecture, sits on the Saone river at the southern end of the Burgundy wine region. The Maconnais vineyards produce Pouilly-Fuisse and other white wines. Le Creusot was an industrial powerhouse in the nineteenth century, home to the Schneider steel and armaments works. The population is around 549,000 and declining. The Canal du Centre connects the Saone to the Loire, part of a network that once carried freight across France.
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Saone-et-Loire is the largest department in Burgundy and contains some of the most important sites of medieval Christendom. Cluny's abbey, founded in 910, was the largest church in the world until Saint Peter's Basilica was rebuilt in Rome. Autun preserves Roman gates and a Romanesque cathedral. Chalon-sur-Saone claims to be the birthplace of photography, as Nicephore Niepce made the first permanent photograph nearby in 1826.
Macon, the prefecture, sits on the Saone river at the southern end of the Burgundy wine region. The Maconnais vineyards produce Pouilly-Fuisse and other white wines. Le Creusot was an industrial powerhouse in the nineteenth century, home to the Schneider steel and armaments works. The population is around 549,000 and declining. The Canal du Centre connects the Saone to the Loire, part of a network that once carried freight across France.
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