Place des Jacobins

The Place des Jacobins centers on a white marble fountain topped by a statue of four famous Lyonnais artists. This square occupies the site where a Dominican convent stood until the French Revolution. When the monks were expelled, the city leveled the buildings to open this wide space. In eighteen eighty-five, the fountain arrived to honor the city's connection to the arts, placing painters and engravers where friars once walked in silence. A bronze plaque near the base still marks the original ground level.