Location information

Autessiodurum (Auxerre)

AUXERRE (Town) BURGUNDY
Autessiodurum (Auxerre) Yonne, France.
Located next to the Yonne on its left bank, the ancient town seems to have had little importance. Julius Caesar makes no mention of it in his Commentaries. Autessioduruin grew only after the Conquest. Owing to its location it became a sort of crossroads where important roads met: from Sens and Lutetia, from Augustodunum (Autun; the road of Agrippa), from Interannum (Entrains), from Augustobona (Troyes). The town seems first to have been located along the sides of the channel of the Vallan and the Yonne. The substructure of a temple dedicated to Apollo has been found in the vicinity of the Fontaine Ronde. A statue of a horseman has been found nearer the Yonne, as well as a column and a capital on which Mercury, Mars, and Apollo can be recognized. Finally, two flat silver dishes (found in 1830) attest that Autessioduruin was a municipality. Since the town continued to grow on the same site, the upper part of the Gallo-Roman remains have disappeared. The real Gallo-Roman city was located on a hill dominating the Yonne.
  The substructures of a rampart furnished with towers have been found at that spot. It is still poorly dated (end of the 3d or beginning of the 4th c.). It is a thick and extremely resistant construction. In general it stands on architectural or carved blocks, some of which date to the 3d c.: pieces of stelae with pictures of individuals or decorative fragments of large size. All of the Gallo-Roman remains are on view at the museum in Saint-Germain abbey.

R. Kapps, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites, Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Feb 2006 from Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.

• http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Per...