Contenu du sommaire : Activité historienne et appartenance urbaine

This paper focuses on an unusual register held in the archives of Saint-Omer, commonly known as the Gros registre du greffe (Ms. 1389). It brings together, in no apparent order, 461 documents dated between 1166 and 1778. In no chronological order, characterised by the handwriting of several scribes, this register compiles copies of the documents and sentences in internal conflicts in which the town was involved as an authority or swept up in as part of a broader history where it was forced to take a stand. This unique compilation allows us to reconsider urban writing in its context of expression and to take another look at the still highly controversial notions of the historical or memorial claims of municipal administrators, whose productions are above all marked by an assumed presentism.

At the beginning of the 17th century, following the Catholic reform and the Tridentine decrees, many urban communities in the Kingdom of France, both large and small, saw a reshaping of their relationship with the sacred. The affirmation of privileged ties with one or more holy figures became a foundation for building a society that was henceforth devout, with holiness as its collective horizon. In this context, the small towns of Étampes and Melun in the Parisian countryside are relevant cases for understanding these new relationships with the sacred, from both material and hagiographic points of view. Relying on local sacred resources that they invented and transformed, they participated in a new norm of urban identity based on practices but also knowledge that made local religious particularities a common requirement in these urban worlds.

Luis López's writings about Zaragoza attracted criticism from local learned communities on two separate occasions. Indeed, the social status and above all the editorial opportunism of this former pastry chef, who glorifies the city's past to offer the municipality the immortality of its ‘trophies', infuriated professional historians, who felt threatened by the intrusion of this ‘outsider'. The reactions sparked within the local learned communities allow us to make sense of the networks of an urban sociability built on a collaborative reconstruction of the city's past. When Luis López is portrayed as ignorant, labelled a forger and a liar, etc., the learned communities are compelled to take a stand for or against him. Interestingly, through the criticisms directed at the pastry chef, we get a chance to probe the historian activity of the times. ‘Goose feather' vs. ‘eagle feather', ‘trophies' vs. ‘truffles', the social identity and the city's identity are both reshaped through the writing of the past.

The Mercure François is a collection of 25 volumes of approximately 1,000 pages each. These volumes were all printed and marketed in Paris between 1611 and 1648. This political news compilation was the work of Jean and Estienne Richer. In the Mercure François, urban policies are described in such a way as to give legitimacy to royal power during a crisis. For the Richers, history has a political and civic role to play. It is also a testimony of a period, just as urban transformations are. Both tell us about a time and pass this message down to posterity. Lastly, the Mercure François provides us with the possibility to study how some of its readers used the historical writing of royal urban policies to assert their own belonging to the city.

Some acts recorded in the registers of Damascus's main court during the Ottoman period relate to architectural inspections of buildings assigned to pious foundations ( waqfs). The administrators of these foundations, and sometimes the tenants of the properties, generally petitioned a judge to grant authorisation for a delegation of court representatives and building professionals to inspect these buildings. Through around fifty documents drawn up at the end of the 17th century and in the first half of the 18th century, we will follow the steps of these inspections and identify the members of these delegations who, after completing their assignment, appeared again before the judge to give their findings. An act was then drawn up, sometimes describing the history of a situation over several decades, and then sometimes referenced in various legal procedures related to the management of properties.

The development of the northern strip of land in central Oran was long delayed by the numerous ravines running across its plateau which prevented its development. Not until the late 1940s, in application of the PAEE (urban development and extension plan) drafted by the Danger brothers and with the major works carried out by the syndicate of the ‘Quartiers neufs' (new districts), were the ravines of Oran filled in so that the Front-de-Mer Boulevard could be extended. In this paper, we will focus on the development of the Cressonnière ravine. This project, carried out in the 1950s, was criticised by some architects of the modern movement due to its cost and austerity. Nevertheless, it represents a lesson in urban planning, whose aesthetic (a mix of military and civil architecture) has since been lost. Through this case study, we will also explore a little-known period of Oran's urban history.

Often studied as a framework or as a metaphor for social movements, streets and their infrastructures are a fertile ground for analysing urban changes. Based on a study of the transformations of the street system of Lyon in the 20th century, this paper aims to explore a few research topics. The study of the technical archives of road services can help to shed light on changes, from material transformations to representations. It can also highlight the wide diversity of the stakeholders, to step away from an overarching view of the city through its plans and political leaders. Finally, the history of the streetscape, with its diversity of territories and urban forms, helps to draw multiple chronologies that transcend conventional political divisions.