Stroll around Douai Stroll around Douai

A journey through the history of France

To stroll around Douai and its surroundings is to take in a thousand-years of history. From the first traces of settlement in the 7th century to its status as the capital of the Nord department in the 19th century, it’s only a short step. Literally. The different eras coexist and offer you a vivid picture of the history of France and the former Spanish Netherlands.
Old Douai is a journey through time itself, shrouded in mystery and legend: with their foundations in the waters of the Scarpe Rover, old sandstone and red brick shops stand alongside medieval alleys with hidden doors, Flemish-inspired bourgeois houses and contemporary works of art.

A stroll through time with magnificent works of art and sculptures

In the Saint-Amé district, the cradle of the city, the well of the castle of the Counts of Flanders, dating from the 11th century, can still be seen in the former cannon foundry created by Louis XIV! There you will find the famous Furibonde, a cannon beautifully cast and sculpted in 1744. Equally magnificent works of art and sculptures await you in the Musée de la Chartreuse. A former convent of Carthusian monks serves as a showcase for them. Wander through the many rooms with works by renowned artists: Van Scorel, Bellegambe, Rubens, Veronese, Ruisdael, Renoir and Pissarro… Enough to compete with the greatest museums!

Douai has it all. Even the English bible

A cloth-making town, a university town but also a very Catholic town until the French Revolution! Douai, a prosperous and fortified ‘city of a hundred steeples’, was home to numerous religious orders, refuges from surrounding abbeys and even members of an English religious college, persecuted and exiled from their country after the Reformation. It was here that the Bible was first translated into English in 1582. Still called the Douai Bible, it is on one of its copies that American Catholic presidents take their oath of office today!