Lyon & Vienne. - Lugdunum vulgo Lion [on sheet with] Vienna vulgo Vienne.

LYON

CAPTION: Lugdunum, in the vernacular Lyon.

Signed centre: Drawn by Georg Hoefnagel after the original by another artist.

COMMENTARY BY BRAUN (on verso): "Lyons is flanked on one side by two densely forested mountains, on the other side flow the Rhône and the Saône. The city lies, so to speak, in the middle of Europe and hence is also considered the heart of France. [...] Four times a year the merchants come to visit the important fairs."

Lyons is seen here from a slightly elevated position to the north. The viewpoint is particularly advantageous as it allows the confluence of the Rhône and Saône, the fortress and the surrounding hills as well as the situation and layout of the city to be seen at a glance. Clearly visible are the ramparts leading down to the Rhône on the left and ascending steeply past Mount Fourvière on the right.

VIENNE

CAPTION: Vienna, in the vernacular Vienne de France.

COMMENTARY BY BRAUN: "Vienne, the capital of the Dauphiné, is one of the oldest cities in France; it borders the Rhône and the territory of Lyons, which is why it lived in discord with Lyons in the past. That Vienne is a very ancient city can also be seen from the bridge over the Rhône, which was built by Tiberius Gracchus on his march through Gaul and who has a castle built on both sides as a garrison."

The view of Vienne is dominated in the foreground by Mount Pipet with its fortress, on whose site there now remains only a chapel and a statue of the Virgin from the 19th century. Within the city itself, which runs along the bank of the Rhône at the foot of Mount Pipet, the Romanesque monastery church of Saint-André-Le-Bas is visible on the right, whereas on the far left one of France's oldest churches can be seen, the former cathedral of Saint-Pierre, whose origins date back to the 5th century. Vienne is famous above all for its Roman past: Roman legionaries settled in the later colony of Vienna as early as the last quarter of the 2nd century BC. Numerous vestiges from this era have survived up the present, including the Roman theatre, still used today, and the temple of Augustus and Livia.

Hoefnagel drew this view after a pen drawing in the Berlin Kupferstichkabinett done between 1568 and 1572 by an anonymous artist called Fabriczy, a pupil of Pieter Brueghel the Elder's.