Nîmes has a unique fresh water spring bubbling out of the plateau in the Cevennes. Under King Louis XV of France, the local people asked for the water from the ‘spring’ to be regulated and controlled. A brilliant civil engineer Jean-Baptiste Maréschal, carried out engineering round the pool of muddy dirty water. With landscaping, the ‘Jardins de la Fontaine’ turned the venture from pure engineering to one of the most beautiful walks in Europe which is much used by the local residents.
Nîmes is home of the cloth used to make jeans. 'Serge de Nîmes’ was used extensively in the manufacture of work clothes in America. But it was probably back in the Middle Ages that the town's textile industry began exporting its cheap, supple, hard wearing serge all over Europe. It is said that the word ‘jeans’ comes from the Genoese word 'Gènes'. Genoese sailors had the fabric died indigo and used it as a uniform. The fabric was also used for making sails because of its hard wearing qualities and cheapness.
The city of Nîmes has many Roman remains, some of which are still in every day use including the large amphitheatre, built around the 1st Century AD. The ‘Maison Carrée’ was built in the 5th Century BC in honour of Augustus' adopted sons and owes its fine state today to the fact it has been in constant use.
Jean Nicot was born in the Place de l’Horloge in 1530. He became Ambassador to Lisbon in Portugal at the age of thirty and on his return to France, brought back a strange herb that was thought to have medicinal qualities - 'Nicitiana' tobacco and ‘nicotine’.
Nîmes has an abundance of museums and sites among which are the Temple of Diana in the Jardins de la Fontaine.
For more tourist information and history, see Premier Pages (Wine Regions, Places of Interest)