HISTORY. The earliest notiee of Paris occurs in •Julius Caesar's rommentnries. in which it is described, under the name of lartetia. as a collec tion of mud huts, the chief settlement of the Parisii, a Gallic tribe conquered by the Romans. The ruins of the Palatium Thermarum IP:dais des Thermes), and of ancient altars.
aqueducts, and other show tl at in :Roman times the town extended to both bank_ of the Seine. Christianity was introduced about A.D. 250 by Saint Denis. In the fourth eentury Lutetia began to lie known as l'ari-ia, or Paris, In the sixth century el os(n t•Iovis as the seat of government; anl aft, r having fallen into decay under the Ca rho ingian kings, in whose time it suffered seccrely from frequent invasions of the Northinen, it thrills' became in the tenth century the residern 0 of Ilugh Capet, the founder of the Capetian dynasty, and the• capital o1 tl e French non irehy. From this period Paris e( 'dinned rapidly to in crease, and in two centuries it had dould,1 in size and population. In the Middle -11.9s was into three distinct parts—La I ib".. on the islands; the Ville, on the right hank: and the Quartier Latin. or university, on the I. ft bank of the river. Louis Xl. did much to enlarge Paris, and to efface the disastri us results of its hostile occupation by the EnJi-li during the wars under Henry \ . and Henry VI. of En dand. Its progress was again checked during the wars of the last of the Valois. when the city sus tained several sieges. (In the accession f lIenry of Navarre in 1589, a new era vvas opened for Paris. The improvements commenced limier his reign were continued during the minority of his son, Louis X111. Louis converted the old ramparts into public walks or boulevards, organ ized a regular system of police, es,tablished dr-lin age and sewerage works, founded hospitals. aln/S 11011SeS, public schools. scientific societies, and a library, and thus gave to Paris a claim to be regarded as the focus of European civilization. 'I•he terrible days of the Revolution (see FRENCH "I:EVOLUTION) caused a temporary The improvement of Paris was c(p.nunced on a new and grander scale under the first Napoleon. when new quays, bridges. markets, streets, squares, and public garden; were created. 111 the treas ures of art and science which conquest p1 iced in his power were applied to the embellishment of Paris, in the restoration of which he spent more than $10.000.000 in twelve 11 is down fall again arrested progress. and in many re spects Paris fell behind other European cities.
Renovation of various sorts was rec?nnmenced under Louis Philippe, under whom fortification; on a colossal scale were constructed, but it was reserved for Napoleon Ill. to render Paris the most eommodious, splendid, and beautiful of modern cities. When he commenced his improve ments Paris still consisted, in the main. of a labyrinth of narrow, dark. and ill ventilated streets. With .the assistance of 11a rim mann. the Prefect of the his schom - wi re carried out with rare enerey and good taste. Two straight and wi he thoroughfares. parallel to and near each other. were made to traNerse the whole width of Paris from north to south en,..
in the a still greater thoroughfare was made to run the whole length of the town, i.orth of the Seine, from east to west. The old bold yards were completed so as to form outer and inner circles of spacious streets, the former ebb f ly lving the outskirts of the old city, t lattk r through and connecting a long line of distant suburbs. In the year when t international exhibition was opened, Paris had become in all respects the most splendid city in Europe, and in that year it was visited by up ward of 1.300.000 foreigners. Many further im provements were contemplated. but financial and political difficulties supervened (see FRANCE), and these great schemes had to be postponed. The siege of Paris by the Germans, which lasted from September 19, 1870, to January 28, ]871, caused much less injury to the city than the vandalism of the Red Republicans, who rose against the Government in March, 1S71. took possession of Paris. and proclaimed the Commune (q.v.) the only lawful Government. Act: of pillage and wanton destruction followed. The column erect ed to the memory of Napoleon and the Great Army, in the Place Vendome, one of the princi pal squares of Paris, was pulled down as 'a monument of tyranny.' When the Government troops under Marshal 31aeMahon pressed forward into the city, in the latter part of May. the Com munists began systematically to set fire with pe troleum to a great number of the chief buildings of Paris, public and private. The fire for time threatened to destroy the whole city. It was not checked until property had been lost to the value of many millions of dollars and his torical monuments were destroyed which never can be replaced. Two years later, however, all the private houses burned had been rebuilt, the monuments only partially injured had been re stored, and the streets and public places were as splendid and gay as in the best days of the Empire. The Universal Expositions of 1878. 1889. and 1900 are among the chief events of the subsequent history of Paris.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Du Camp. Paris, scs organes, Bibliography. Du Camp. Paris, scs organes, srs fouctions et sa ric (8th ed., Paris, 1893) ; Franklin, Les anciens plans de Paris, notices historiques ct topographiqucs (ib., MO) ; Block and Pontich, Administration de la rills de Paris (ib.. 1884) ; Col*. Paris, sa topographic, son hygiene. ses maladies ( 1885) ; Dournon, Paris, histoire, monuments. administration (ib., 1887); Hamerton, Paris in Old and Present Times (London, l884) ; Hare, Paris (London, l887): Piton, Comment Paris s'est transforme, histoire, topographic (Paris. 1891); Bougard, La ric de Paris (ib., 1891) ; De Amieis. Studies of Paris, trans. by Cady (New York, 1892) ; Schmidt. Paris (Paris, 1900) ; Riat, Paris. Ge schiehte seiner Kanstdenkiniiler(Leipzig, 1900) ; Polfo, Plan pittorcsque de la Mille de Paris (ib., 1900) ; Encyclopedic municipale de la rills de Paris (Paris. 1902); Annuaire statistique de la rifle de Paris; also the guide books of Jo anne. Baedeker. .Julius Meyer, Grieben, and Mur ray. Consult, also. Lacombe, Bibliographic pari sienne (Paris, 1886). •