- Marseilles redirects here. There is also Marseilles,
Illinois.
Marseille.
Marseille (English Marseilles, Provençal
Marsilha) is the second largest city in France. Located in the former province of Provence
and on the Mediterranean sea, it is France's largest commercial
port.
It has a population of 807,071 (1999 census), and 1,516,340 for the wider Marseille-Aix-en-Provence urban area (in French: aire
urbaine).
Marseille is the préfecture (capital) of the Bouches-du-Rhône département.
History
Marseille was founded in 600 BC by Phoceans. During the Roman times, it was called Massilia.
Highlights
Culture
The French rap band IAM is from
Marseille.
The most widely circulated tarot deck comes from Marseille; it is called the Tarot
de Marseille, and was used to play the local variant of tarocchi before it
came to the notice of people who used it in cartomancy.
Miscellaneous
The metro is rubber-tired.
The city's main football club is Olympique de Marseille, Champions League winner in 1993 but tainted by the 1990s match-fixing scandal by then-owner Bernard Tapie.
Marseille was the birthplace of:
- Jean-Henry Gourgaud, aka. "Dugazon" (1746-1809),
actor
- Désirée Clary (1777-1860), wife of King Carl XIV Johann of Sweden, and therefore Queen Desirée
or Queen Desideria of Sweden
- Adolphe Thiers (1797-1877), first president of the Third Republic
- Etienne Joseph Louis
Garnier-Pages (1801-1841), politician
- Honore Daumier (1808-1879), caricaturist and painter
- Joseph Autran (1813-1877), poet
- Olivier Émile Ollivier (1825-1913),
statesman
- Joseph Pujol, aka. "Le Pétomane" (1857-1945), entertainer
- Edmond Rostand (1868-1918), poet and dramatist
- Vincent Scotto
(1876-1952), guitarist, songwriter
- Fernandel (1903-1971), actor
- Eliane
Browne-Bartroli (1917-1944), French Resistance, Croix de
Guerre
- Louis Jourdan (born 1919), actor
- Jean Pierre Rampal (1922-2000), flute player
- Jean-Claude Izzo
(1945-2000), author
- Zinedine Zidane (born 1972), soccer player
External links
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