City of Paris 1380

In 1328, a census reported 61,098 households in Paris, with perhaps 250,000 inhabitants. In the following century plague and war would halve the population. Its nerve centre was the Île de la Cité, where both the Royal Palace and the Cathedral of Notre-Dame were situated. The Palace also housed the Law Courts and Parliament, and Philip II (r. 1180–1223) began the conversion of the Louvre Fortress for entertaining, while Charles V (r. 1364–80) constructed the Royal House at St-Pol, protected by the great fortress of Bastille. Philip II built the inner wall, while Charles V commissioned an outer wall to enclose the enlarged city on the Right Bank. Thirty-three parish churches were under the supervision of Notre-Dame, which also housed an illustrious school (seven popes were alumni). Abbeys and convents were concentrated on the Left Bank: St Geneviève’s centre of learning became the University of Paris (1215).