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Dijon owes its origins to its strategic position in Celtic times on the tin merchants' route from Britain up the Seine and across the Alps to the Adriatic. It became the capital of the dukes of Burgundy in around 1000 AD, but its golden age occurred in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries under the auspices of dukes Philippe le Hardi (the Bold), who as a boy had fought the English at Poitiers and been taken prisoner, Jean sans Peur (the Fearless), Philippe le Bon (the Good), who sold Joan of Arc to the English, and Charles le Téméraire (the Bold). They used their tremendous wealth and power - especially their control of Flanders, the dominant manufacturing region of the age - to make Dijon one of the greatest centres of art, learning and science in Europe. It lost its capital status on incorporation into the kingdom of France in 1477, but has remained one of the country's pre-eminent provincial cities, especially since the rail and industrial booms of the mid-nineteenth century. Today, it is smart, modern and young, especially when the students are around.
The rue de la Liberté forms the major east-west axis of the town, running from the wide, attractive place Darcy and the eighteenth-century triumphal arch of Porte Guillaume , once a city gate, past the palace of the dukes of Burgundy on the semicircular place de la Libération , east to the church of St Michel . The street is pedestrianized and lined with smart shops and elegant old houses, and most places of interest are within fifteen minutes' walk to the north or south of it.
Dijon is not an enormous city and the part you'll want to see is neatly confined in the centre and eminently walkable.
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