David Downie's Paris Timeline

David Downie’s Paris: Time Line

Entertaining, informative, opinionated: David Downie’s Paris: Time Line brings Paris alive.

When, where, what and who: David Downie’s Paris Time Line features key dates, places, events and people in Paris’s 2,000+ years of history. It’s all you need to explore the City of Light on site or in an armchair, from the time when Paris was a pre-Roman settlement of mud huts, to the kaleidoscopic megalopolis of the present day.
Fully illustrated with hundreds of historic images or contemporary photos, this app tells you where to go to see Paris’s history alive today or documented in the streets, monuments, churches, museums, parks, and gardens of the city.
While you roam the streets of Paris, David Downie’s Paris Time Line will help you discover what you’re looking at, when it was built or came into being, and what historical or contemporary figures are associated with the site.
You can also search by name — Napoleon for example—or by event-driven term—Impressionism for instance.
This app is executable on your hand-held device. You won’t have roaming charges to pay in Paris unless you choose to exit the app to browse the Web or use interactive maps.

Author, journalist and private tour guide David Downie has written over a dozen nonfiction and fiction books, including the critically acclaimed Paris to the Pyrenees: A Skeptic Pilgrim Walks the Way of Saint James (April 2013), the bestselling classic Paris, Paris: Journey into the City of Light, and the chilling thriller Paris City of Night. He has contributed to scores of anthologies, and over 50 top print magazines and newspapers worldwide, plus many websites and blogs.
David Downie’s personal Paris time-line starts in 1976. That’s when he spent two life-changing weeks in an apartment above the original Shakespeare & Company bookstore in Rue de l’Odéon, made famous by Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce and other modernist writers. In 1986 he settled into a 7th-floor garret in the 17th arrondissement and began the explorations that to this day keep him fascinated by the City of Light and its layered history. Paris’s past is alive in the streets, buildings, monuments, churches and historical personalities that make it the world’s favorite city. Downie lives in the Marais and is married to photographer Alison Harris, who contributed some of the contemporary photos in this app.
David Downie’s websites are www.davidddownie.com and www.parisparistours.com.

Photographer Alison Harris has illustrated dozens of travel and food books, worked for magazines and newspapers worldwide, and shown her photographs in galleries and museums in Paris, New York, Milan, Genoa, Chicago, San Francisco and Texas. Her photos are in museum collections in Paris and Vienna. Visit her photo website at AlisonHarris.com

David Downie’s Paris: Time Line

The Historical Present: History Comes Alive in Paris

The streets, courtyards, monuments, museums, churches, parks, gardens and riverbanks of Paris are living volumes open to anyone who cares to read them. It helps to have a handful of key dates and a cast of characters, places and events in mind, from Julius Caesar’s conquest to Napoleon or Charles de Gaulle.
Paris is the modern capital of one of the world’s richest, most industrialized nations. But traces of the city’s 2,000-year history crop up everywhere you turn: Paris lives in the historical present. Pick a period or a historical theme, event or date, or a character or search term, hit the streets and you’ll find something to transport you down a time tunnel of your own making. Or kick back in your favorite armchair and cruise the centuries through images and words. Just click on the date, name, site or event to read more and navigate the city past and present.

Copyright 2013 All Rights Reserved by David Downie, including all original images by Alison Harris (www.alisonharris.com) or David Downie (www.davidddownie.com).