20 Facts About Montpellier

Montpellier is a city in southern France near the Mediterranean Sea.

Above the medieval city, the ancient citadel of Montpellier is a stronghold built in the seventeenth century by Louis XIII of France.

Since the 1990s, Montpellier has experienced one of the strongest economic and demographic growth in the country.

Montpellier was nominated for "Best Emerging Culture City of the Year 2017" by the think tank LCD.

Montpellier is the third-largest French city near the Mediterranean coast, behind Marseille and Nice.

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Montpellier, first mentioned in a document of 985, was founded under a local feudal dynasty, the Guilhem, who combined two hamlets and built a castle and walls around the united settlement.

Montpellier came to prominence in the 12th century—as a trading centre, with trading links across the Mediterranean world, and a rich Jewish cultural life that flourished within traditions of tolerance of Muslims, Jews and Cathars—and later of its Protestants.

William VIII of Montpellier gave freedom for all to teach medicine in Montpellier in 1180.

The city became a possession of the Kings of Aragon in 1204 by the marriage of Peter II of Aragon with Marie of Montpellier, who was given the city and its dependencies as part of her dowry.

Montpellier gained a charter in 1204 when Peter and Marie confirmed the city's traditional freedoms and granted the city the right to choose twelve governing consuls annually.

Under the Kings of Aragon, Montpellier became a very important city, a major economic centre and the primary centre for the spice trade in the Kingdom of France.

Montpellier remained a possession of the crown of Aragon until it passed to James III of Majorca, who sold the city to the French king Philip VI in 1349, to raise funds for his ongoing struggle with Peter IV of Aragon.

At the time of the Reformation in the 16th century, many of the inhabitants of Montpellier became Protestants and the city became a stronghold of Protestant resistance to the Catholic French crown.

Montpellier has a Mediterranean climate, with cool, damp winters, and hot, rather dry summers.

Since 2001, Montpellier has been divided into seven official neighborhoods, themselves divided into sub-neighborhoods.

For most of its history, and even today, Montpellier is known for its significant Spanish population, heritage and influence.

University of Montpellier is one of the oldest in the world, founded in 1160, and having been granted a charter in 1220 by Cardinal Conrad von Urach and confirmed by Pope Nicholas IV in a papal bull of 1289.

Montpellier school of medicine owed its success to the ruling of the Guilhems, lords of the town, by which any licensed physician might lecture there; there was no fixed limit to the number of teachers, lectures were multiplied, and there was a great wealth of teaching.

Transports de l'agglomeration de Montpellier manages the city's public transportation, including its 56-kilometre tramway network consisting of four lines and several parking facilities.

Montpellier was the finish of Stage 11 and the departure of Stage 12 in the 2007 Tour de France.