Agen

History

Agen (Latin Aginnum) was the capital of the Celtic tribe of the Nitiobroges, and the discovery of extensive ruins attests its importance under the Roman Empire. In later times it was the capital of the Agenais region. Its bishopric was founded in the 4th century. Agen changed hands more than once in the course of the Albigensian wars, and at their close a tribunal of inquisition was established in the town and inflicted cruel persecution on the heretics. During the religious wars of the 16th century, Agen took the part of the Catholics and openly joined the League in 1589.

The Hôtel de Ville was completed in around 1666.

Geography

The city of Agen lies in the southwestern department of Lot-et-Garonne in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region. The city centre lies on the east bank of the river Garonne, the Canal de Garonne flows through the city, approximately halfway between Bordeaux 132 km and Toulouse 107 km.

Climate

Agen features an oceanic climate (Cfb) in the Köppen climate classification and according to the latest temperature numbers borders a humid subtropical climate (Cfa). According to the Trewartha climate classification the climate is now humid subtropical (Cf). Winters are mild and feature cool to cold temperatures while summers are mild and warm. Rainfall is spread equally throughout the year; however, most sunshine hours are from March–September. |Jan record high C = 20.1 |Feb record high C = 25.2 |Mar record high C = 26.5 |Apr record high C = 30.2 |May record high C = 34.7 |Jun record high C = 39.3 |Jul record high C = 40.6 |Aug record high C = 42.5 |Sep record high C = 36.7 |Oct record high C = 32.9 |Nov record high C = 25.4 |Dec record high C = 21.6 |year record high C = 42.5 |Jan record low C = -17.4 |Feb record low C = -21.9 |Mar record low C = -10.5 |Apr record low C = -3.9 |May record low C = -1.6 |Jun record low C = 2.5 |Jul record low C = 5.9 |Aug record low C = 4.7 |Sep record low C = 1.0 |Oct record low C = -5.0 |Nov record low C = -8.8 |Dec record low C = -12.1 |year record low C = -21.9 |access-date=22 November 2024}}}}

Toponymy

From Occitan Agen (1197), itself from Latin Aginnum (3rd century Itinéraire d'Antonin), from a Celtic root agin- meaning "rock or height".

Population

| graph-pos = bottom |1793 |19639 |1800 |9876 |1806 |10850 |1821 |11659 |1831 |12631 |1836 |13399 |1841 |14987 |1846 |15517 |1851 |16027 |1856 |17667 |1861 |17263 |1866 |18222 |1872 |18887 |1876 |19503 |1881 |20485 |1886 |22055 |1891 |23234 |1896 |22730 |1901 |22482 |1906 |23141 |1911 |23294 |1921 |23391 |1926 |23530 |1931 |24939 |1936 |27152 |1946 |33397 |1954 |32593 |1962 |32800 |1968 |34949 |1975 |34039 |1982 |31593 |1990 |30553 |1999 |30170 |2007 |33863 |2012 |33730 |2017 |33576 |2023 |32801

Economy

The town has a higher level of unemployment than the national average. Major employers include the pharmaceutical factory UPSA.

Sights

thumb|Museum of Fine Arts seen from the Place du Dr Esquirol. The old centre of town contains a number of medieval buildings.

The twelfth century Agen Cathedral, dedicated to Saint Caprasius, is one of the few large churches in France with a double nave, a regional trait also found in the Church of the Jacobins in nearby Toulouse.

The Saint Hilaire church, dedicated to the theme of the Holy Trinity which the Saint in question did a lot to defend, is notable for its unusual statues in front of the Church – Moses on the right, and St Peter on the left.

The art museum, the , contains artefacts, furniture and sculptures from prehistoric times onwards. The art gallery contains several hundred works, including several by Goya, and others by Bonnard and Seurat. The collection also contains a large number of works by artists who lived locally. The museum is made up of twenty or so rooms.

The Canal des Deux Mers, which joins the Mediterranean with the Atlantic, crosses the river Garonne at Agen via the town's famous canal bridge.

Colour photography pioneer

Louis Arthur Ducos du Hauron (1837 – 1920), a pioneer of colour photography lived and worked in Agen. He developed practical processes for colour photography on the three-colour principle, using both additive and subtractive methods. In 1868 he patented his ideas (French Patent No. 83061) and in 1869 he published them in Les couleurs en photographie, solution du problème.

The most widely reproduced of his surviving colour photographs is the View of Agen, an 1877 landscape, printed by the subtractive assembly method which he pioneered. Several different photographs of the view from his attic window, one dated 1874, also survive.

Entertainment

The municipal theatre "Théâtre Ducourneau" presents theatre, and occasionally classical concerts. The smaller "Théâtre du jour" has a resident theatre company presenting a variety of recent or older plays (Shakespeare, Beckett, as well as lesser known playwrights).

There are two cinemas, one a commercial multiscreened affair, the other an arts cinema run by a voluntary organization. The latter organizes film festivals every year.

Sport

Rugby is extremely popular in the town, and the local team, SU Agen, is enthusiastically supported. The town also serves as the base for the Team Lot-et-Garonne cycling team.

Transport

The Gare d'Agen connects Agen with Toulouse and Bordeaux as well as Périgueux. It is around an hour from Toulouse and around an hour from Bordeaux. The TGV train to Paris takes three hours and thirteen minutes with a stop in Bordeaux.

Agen is connected, by the A62 autoroute, to both Toulouse and Bordeaux.

The Agen Airport is serviced by Airlinair service to Paris Orly 6 days a week. It is also used for business and leisure flying.

Agen stands on the voie verte cycle path between the Mediterranean and close to Bordeaux.

Diocese

Main article: Diocese of Agen

Agen is the seat of a Roman Catholic diocese that comprises the Département of Lot and Garonne. It is a suffragan of the archdiocese of Bordeaux.

Twin towns – sister cities

Agen is twinned with:

• USA Corpus Christi, United States
• GER Dinslaken, Germany
• USA Galena, Illinois, United States
• UK Llanelli, Wales, United Kingdom
• ESP Toledo, Spain
• RUS Tuapse, Russia

Notable people

;As place of birth

• Saint Caprasius of Agen, a Christian martyr and saint of the 4th. century
• Phoebadius of Agen (died ca. 392), a Catholic bishop of the fourth century.
• Bernard Palissy (ca.1510–1590), potter, he may have been born in Saintes.
• Joseph Justus Scaliger (1540–1609), Calvinist religious leader and scholar.
• Pierre Dupuy (1582–1651), writer and scholar.
• Francés de Corteta (1586-1667), nobleman and poet
• Joseph Barsalou (1600–1660), apothecary and physician.
• Godefroi, Comte d'Estrades (1607–1686), diplomatist and Marshal of France.
• Bernard Germain de Lacépède (1756–1825), naturalist and active freemason.
• Jean Hilaire Asté (1775–1840), professor of music and instrument-maker, inventied the ophicleide
• Jean Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent (1780–1846), naturalist and politician.
• Jacques Jasmin (1798–1864), Provençal poet.
• Victor Rabu (1834–1907), architect, built many churches in Montevideo, Uruguay
• Joseph Chaumié (1849–1919), politician
• Les Lalanne, artists and sculptors François-Xavier Lalanne (1927–2008) and Claude Lalanne (1924–2019).
• Michel Serres (born 1930), philosopher and author
• Jacques Sadoul (born 1934), novelist, book editor and non-fiction author
• Jean Cruguet (born 1939), jockey who won the U.S. Triple Crown of thoroughbred racing
• Alain Aspect (born 1947), physicist and Nobel Prize in Physics winner in 2022
• Francis Cabrel (born 1953), singer-songwriter and guitarist
• Bernard Campan (born 1958), actor, film director and writer
• Emmanuel Flipo (born 1958), artist
• Bernard Andrieu (born 1959, philosopher and historian
• Béatrice Uria-Monzon (1963–2025), mezzo-soprano.
• Stéphane Rideau (born 1976), actor
• Fabien Barcella (born 1983), former rugby union player with 20 caps for France
• Aymeric Laporte (born 1994), footballer with 20 caps for Spain
• Brice Dulin, (born 1990), rugby union player with 36 caps for France.

;As residence

• Julius Caesar Scaliger In 1525 he became physician to Antonio della Rovera, bishop of Agen, and remained until his death in 1558.
• Nostradamus lived in Agen from 1531 until at least 1534. He was married to a local woman with whom he had two children.

Miscellaneous

Agen is the "capital of the prune", a local product consumed as a sweet, either stuffed with prune purée or in pastries, or as a dessert, e.g., prunes soaked in Armagnac, a type of brandy. On the last weekend of August, a prune festival comprises rock concerts, circus performances and prune tastings.

Jewish presence

The first Jews settled in the town in the twelfth century AD. They were expelled from the town in 1306. A number of Jews returned to the town in 1315, and a "Rue des Juifs" is documented ever since this period. In 1968, about 600 Jews lived in the town, though most of them had emigrated from North Africa. A Jewish synagogue still exists in the town.

References

References

1. (2 December 2020). "Répertoire national des élus: les maires".
2. {{EB1911
3. Labrunie, Joseph. (1889). "Revue de l'Agenais et des anciennes provinces du Sud-Ouest: historique, littéraire, scientifique et artistique: Abrégé chronologique des antiquités d'Agen". Académie des sciences, lettres et arts (Agen).
4. Bénédicte Boyrie-Fénié, avec la collaboration d’André Bianchi, Pèire Boissière, Patrice Gentié et Maurice Romieu, Dictionnaire toponymique des communes du Lot-et-Garonne, Pau, Éditions Cairn, décembre 2012, 320 p. ({{ISBN. 978-2-35068-231-0), p. 41.
5. {{Cassini-Ehess. 148. Agen
6. [https://www.insee.fr/fr/statistiques/8643952?geo=COM-47001#tableau-POPREF_G1 Population municipale entre 1968 et 2023], INSEE
7. "Agen – Tourist Office – The History of Agen – Origins". ot-agen.org.
8. (18 November 1935). "Lumière Jubilee.". [[Time (magazine).
9. (April 1952). "Forgotten Pioneers IV: Louis Ducos Du Hauron (1837–1920)". International Museum of Photography at George Eastman House Inc..
10. Dr. Carl Finch. (1920). "Photo-Era, The American Journal of Photography". New England Photo Era Publishing Company.
11. "Jumelages et coopérations". Agen.
12. "2018 Annual Impact Report". Sister Cities International.
13. (1 July 2019). "Galena, French sister city team up for 'La Fete en Blanc'". Telegraph Herald.
14. {{Cite EB1911. Burton. William
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21. [http://www.uria-monzon.com/biographie.phtml Uria Monzon biography]
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24. "Synagogues in Agen, France".