How many French sites are listed by UNESCO? And which ones? Here’s an infographic looking at UNESCO sites in France, region by region!
« To be included on the World Heritage List, sites must be of outstanding universal value and meet at least one of the ten selection criteria. » – UNESCO
On July 4, the « Haut lieu tectonique Chaîne des Puys – faille de Limagne » was recognized by UNESCO.
Indeed, this natural asset in the Auvergne region is now one of 44 French sites on the World Heritage list.
With this inscription, France is now on a par with Germany in terms of the number of UNESCO sites, behind Italy (53), China (52) and Spain (47).
To mark the European Heritage Days, taking place over the weekend of September 15-16, Generation Voyage has compiled a list of all these sites in an infographic, which you can discover below!
Discover the complete list of World Heritage sites in France in detail: their origins, their history and the reasons for their inclusion.
Historic site of Lyon
Lyon’s long history is vividly illustrated by its urban fabric and numerous historic buildings from all eras.
Tectonic high spot Chaîne des Puys – Limagne fault
As the latest World Heritage site, it is an exceptional illustration of the phenomenon of continental break-up.
Basilica and hill of Vézelay
The basilica of Sainte-Madeleine, a 12th-century monastic church, is a masterpiece of Burgundian Romanesque architecture, with its portal and sculpted capitals.
Cistercian Abbey of Fontenay
Founded in 1119 by Saint Bernard, the Burgundian abbey of Fontenay exemplifies the ideal of self-sufficiency of the first communities of Cistercian monks.
The Grande Saline of Salins-les-Bains
The Saline Royale d’Arc-et-Senans was designed to enable rational, hierarchical organization of work. The Saline de Salins, on the other hand, houses a 13th-century underground gallery with a 19th-century hydraulic pump still in operation.
The climats of the Burgundy vineyards
Climats are parcels of vines precisely delimited on the slopes of the Côte de Nuits and Côte de Beaune, south of Dijon. The site is a remarkable example of wine production developed since the early Middle Ages.
Prehistoric palaeolithic sites around the Alps
These settlements constitute a unique group of 111 particularly rich and well-preserved archaeological sites, and represent important sources for the study of the region’s early agrarian societies.
Place Stanislas, Place de la Carrière and Place d’Alliance, Nancy
Nancy, the temporary residence of Stanislas Leszczynski, a king without a kingdom who became Duke of Lorraine, is paradoxically the oldest and most typical example of a modern capital where an enlightened monarch is concerned with public utility.
Notre-Dame Cathedral, Basilica and Abbey of Saint-Rémi and Palais du Tau, Reims
The exceptional use of new 13th-century architectural techniques and the harmonious marriage of sculptural decoration with architectural elements have made Notre-Dame de Reims cathedral one of the masterpieces of Gothic art.
Champagne hillsides, houses and cellars
These are the premises where the sparkling wine production method was developed, thanks to secondary fermentation in the bottle. The property clearly illustrates how this production evolved from a highly specialized craft to an agro-industrial enterprise.
Strasbourg: from the Grande-île to the Neustadt, a European urban scene
The dual influence of this property has created a specific urban pattern in Strasbourg, where the vistas created from the cathedral open onto a unified landscape organized around waterways and canals.
The architectural work of Le Corbusier, an exceptional contribution to the Modern Movement
A collection of 17 sites in seven countries, built over half a century in what Le Corbusier called a « patient search ». These masterpieces of human genius also attest to the internationalization of architectural practice on a global scale.
The Pilgrim‘s Way to Santiago de Compostela in France
Throughout the Middle Ages, Santiago de Compostela was the most important destination of all for countless pilgrims from all over Europe. To reach Spain, pilgrims had to cross France. The tradition continues to this day.
Vauban fortifications
Vauban played a major role in the history of fortifications, influencing military architecture in Europe and on other continents until the mid-19th century. Vauban’s work includes 12 groups of fortified buildings and constructions along the northern, eastern and western borders of France. These sites are inscribed as witnesses to the apogee of classical bastioned fortification, typical of Western military architecture.
Amiens Cathedral
Amiens Cathedral, in the heart of Picardy, is one of the largest « classical » Gothic churches of the 13th century.
Belfries of Belgium and France
Twenty-three belfries in northern France and the Gembloux belfry in Belgium were listed in 2005, as an extension of the 32 Belgian belfries listed in 1999 under the name Beffrois de Flandre et de Wallonie.
Nord-Pas-de-Calais coalfield
The site bears witness to the quest for the working-class housing model and illustrates a significant period in the history of industrial Europe.
Palace and park of Versailles
The preferred residence of the French monarchy from Louis XIV to Louis XVI, the Château de Versailles, embellished by several generations of designers, was for over a century the model of what a royal residence should be.
Palace and park of Fontainebleau
Used by the kings of France since the 12th century, the hunting residence of Fontainebleau was transformed, enlarged and embellished in the 16th century by François I, who wanted to turn it into a « new Rome ». Surrounded by a vast park, the château, inspired by Italian models, was a meeting place for Renaissance art and French traditions.
Paris, banks of the Seine
The evolution of Paris and its history can be seen from the Seine; Notre-Dame Cathedral and the Sainte-Chapelle are architectural masterpieces. As for the wide squares and avenues built by Haussmann, they influenced urban planning in the late 19th and 20th centuries the world over.
Provins, medieval fair town
The fortified medieval town of Provins lies at the heart of the former region of the powerful Counts of Champagne. Provins has preserved its urban structure, designed specifically to host fairs and related activities.
Le Havre, the city rebuilt by Auguste Perret
The city of Le Havre was heavily bombed during the Second World War. The destroyed area was rebuilt between 1945 and 1964 to the design of a team led by Auguste Perret. Among the many cities rebuilt in the post-war period, Le Havre is exceptional for its unity and integrity in terms of urban planning and construction technology.
Mont-Saint-Michel and its bay
Or the « wonder of the West », rising on a rocky islet amidst sandstorms and powerful tides. The construction of the Gothic-style Benedictine abbey dedicated to the archangel St. Michael, which continued from the 11th to the 16th century, was a technical and artistic tour de force, adapting to a very difficult natural site.
Chartres Cathedral
Built in part from 1145 onwards, and rebuilt in twenty-six years after the fire of 1194, Chartres cathedral is the quintessential monument of French Gothic art: its vast nave in the purest Ogival style, its porches and its stained-glass windows make it an exceptional masterpiece that has been remarkably well preserved.
Bourges Cathedral
Built between the end of the 12th and the end of the 13th centuries, Saint-Etienne’s Cathedral in Bourges is one of the great masterpieces of Gothic art. Beyond its architectural beauty, it bears witness to the power of Christianity in medieval France.
Loire Valley between Sully-sur-Loire and Chalonnes
The Loire Valley is an exceptional cultural landscape, comprising historic towns and villages, great architectural monuments – the chateaux – and cultivated land, shaped by centuries of interaction between people and their physical environment, including the Loire itself.
Prehistoric sites and decorated caves in the Vézère valley
The prehistoric site is of exceptional interest from an ethnological, anthropological and aesthetic point of view, with its parietal paintings in the image of the Lascaux cave, whose discovery (in 1940) marked a milestone in the history of prehistoric art.
Abbey of Saint-Savin sur Gartempe
Nicknamed the « Romanesque Sistine Chapel », the abbey of Saint-Savin in Poitou is decorated with numerous beautiful wall paintings from the 11th and 12th centuries, which have survived in a remarkably fresh state.
Jurisdiction of Saint-Émilion
Viticulture was introduced to this fertile region of Aquitaine by the Romans and intensified in the Middle Ages. This is an exceptional landscape, entirely devoted to winegrowing, whose towns and villages boast many fine historical monuments.
Bordeaux, Port de la Lune
The historic center of this port city in southwest France represents an exceptional urban and architectural ensemble, created in the Age of Enlightenment, whose values endured well into the first half of the 20th century.
Pont du Gard
The Pont du Gard was built shortly before the Christian era to enable the Nîmes aqueduct, almost 50 km long, to cross the Gardon river. In imagining this 50 m-high, three-level bridge, the longest of which measures 275 m, Roman hydraulic engineers and architects created a technical masterpiece that is also a work of art.
Canal du Midi
With its 360 km of navigable waterways linking the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, and its 328 structures (locks, aqueducts, bridges, tunnels, etc.), the Canal du Midi network, built between 1667 and 1694, is one of the most extraordinary civil engineering achievements of the modern era, paving the way for the Industrial Revolution.
Pyrenees-Mont Perdu
This exceptional mountain landscape, which spans both sides of the current national borders of France and Spain, is centered on the Mont Perdu peak, a limestone massif that rises to 3,352 m. The site is also a pastoral landscape, reflecting an agricultural way of life once widespread in Europe’s mountainous regions.
Historic fortified town of Carcassonne
Fortifications have been erected on the hill where Carcassonne is located today since pre-Roman times. In its present form, it is a remarkable example of a fortified medieval city with an enormous defensive system surrounding the château and its associated corps de logis, the streets and the superb Gothic cathedral.
Episcopal city of Albi
In the 13th century, the town became a powerful episcopal city in the wake of the Albigensian Crusade against the Cathars. Its original Southern Gothic style, based on locally-produced red and orange bricks, reflects the blossoming of a medieval architectural and urban ensemble.
The Causses and Cévennes, a cultural landscape of Mediterranean agro-pastoralism
Situated in the south of France’s Massif Central, the Causses are a landscape of mountains interwoven with deep valleys. The villages and large stone farms on the deep terraces of the Causses reflect the organization of the great abbeys from the 11th century onwards.
Arles, Roman and Romanesque monuments
Arles is an interesting example of how an ancient city adapted to the civilization of medieval Europe. It boasts impressive Roman monuments, the oldest of which – the arena, ancient theater and cryptoporticus – date back to the 1st century BC.
Ancient theater and its surroundings and the Orange « Arc de Triomphe
In the Rhône valley, the ancient theater of Orange, with its 103 m long front wall, is one of the best preserved of the great Roman theaters. The Roman triumphal arch of Orange is one of the most beautiful and interesting provincial triumphal arches from the Augustan period.
Historic center of Avignon: Palais des papes, Episcopal complex and Pont d’Avignon
This city in the south of France was the seat of the papacy in the 14th century. The Palais des Papes, an austere-looking fortress, dominates the city, while its ring of ramparts, the remains of a 12th-century bridge, the Petit Palais and the Romanesque cathedral of Notre-Dame-des-Doms complete an exceptional monumental ensemble that bears witness to Avignon ‘s eminent role in Christian Europe in the 14th century.
Gulf of Porto: Calanche de Piana, Gulf of Girolata, Scandola reserve
The reserve, part of Corsica « s regional nature park, occupies the Scandola peninsula. Its vegetation is a remarkable example of maquis. Gulls, cormorants and sea eagles can be found here. The transparent waters, with their inaccessible islets and caves, are home to a rich marine life.
Pitons, cirques and ramparts of Reunion Island
This property coincides with the core zone of the Parc National de la Réunion, an island of two volcanic massifs in the southwestern Indian Ocean. Dominated by two volcanic peaks, the site features a wide variety of escarpments, gorges and wooded basins, which together create a spectacular landscape.
Lagoons of New Caledonia: reef diversity and associated ecosystems
Located in this French archipelago in the South Pacific, it represents one of the three largest reef systems in the world, home to intact ecosystems populated by exceptional marine biodiversity, large predators and a considerable number of different large fish. They provide a habitat for many emblematic and endangered marine species.
Taputapuatea
Located on the island of Ra’iātea, in the heart of the « Polynesian Triangle ». At the heart of this property is the Taputapuātea marae, a political, ceremonial and funerary center. Widespread in Polynesia, marae were linking spaces between the world of the living and that of the ancestors and gods. Taputapuātea bears exceptional witness to 1,000 years of Mā’ohi civilization.
A different scenario for many Tentative List monuments
Since the creation of the World Heritage List in 1978, 1,092 sites have been classified worldwide, including 44 in France.
Indeed, obtaining this status is no easy matter; the reason being a selection procedure imposed by the committee. To be included on the World Heritage List, sites must be of outstanding universal value and meet at least one of the ten selection criteria.
Great sites fail to make the grade: 2 months ago, the regional press of the Sud de France expressed its disappointment at UNESCO’s decision to « Defer consideration of the nomination of theHistoric Urban Complex of Nîmes for inclusion on the World Heritage List ». Despite the preservation of all the Roman buildings and archaeological remains, the enthusiasm of the local population was not enough to register the ancient city as a listed site.
A similar return to square one for 11 of the 30 properties nominated this year by the 42nd World Heritage Committee, held between June 24 and July 4 in Bahrain. These were then placed on the tentative list of properties that each State Party intends to propose for inscription.
To date, 37 French sites are being encouraged to re-evaluate their applications so that they can one day join the list – among them:
- The Camargue
- Bouches de Bonifacio
- Ecrins National Park
- Port-Cros National Park
- Guérande salt marshes
- The Mediterranean shore of the Pyrenees
- Marseille harbor
- The ancient cities of the Narbonne and their territory: Nîmes, Arles, Glanum, aqueducts, via Domitia
- The Cerdagne railroad
- Office National d’Etudes et de Recherches Aérospatiales, Meudon, France
- Hangar Y
- Former Menier chocolate factory in Noisiel
- Cordouan lighthouse
- Old town of Sarlat
- Rochefort Arsenal and fortifications on the Charente estuary
- Set of concretion caves in southern France
- Vanoise National Park
- Mont Blanc Massif
- Carnac megalithic sites
- Saint-Denis Cathedral
- Rouen: timber-framed urban ensemble, cathedral, Saint-Ouen church, Saint Maclou church
- Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte
- The bastioned towns of northwestern Europe’s Netherlands
- The Fontainebleau forest massif
- Montagne Sainte-Victoire and Cézanne sites
- Volcanic and forested areas of Martinique
- Cité de Carcassonne and its mountain sentinel castles
- French Southern Territories National Nature Reserve
- The Charolais-Brionnais, a cultural landscape of cattle breeding
- The Mediterranean Alps
- Europe’s great water cities
- Marquesas Islands
- D-Day Beaches, Normandy, 1944
- Metz Royale et Impériale, power issues, stylistic confrontations and urban identity
- Nice, the new city born of tourism, or the invention of the Riviera
- Nîmes, Antiquity in the present
- First World War memorial sites (Western Front)
So, when will they be included on UNESCO’s World Heritage List?