There is a Christmas Market in Place Rihour each day between late November and late December . There are usually about 80 different stalls. A Big Wheel is set up in Grand'Place (Place du General de Gaulle).
In 2008 the market will be open daily from Wednesday 19 November 2008 until Tuesday 30 December 2008 (most activity takes place before Christmas Eve, which is on Wednesday 24 December 2008). At the time of writing full details had not yet been released, but usually the market is open from 11am-8pm and is open until 9pm on Fridays and Saturdays, with a special late night opening (until 10pm) on the first two Saturdays in December.
Stalls fill Place Rihour ...
Euralille is a large indoor shopping centre, located near to the Eurostar train station. It includes over 140 shops on two levels.
Wazemmes street market takes place every Sunday morning.
The Braderie is a large street market in Old Lille, held on the first weekend in September (all day on Saturday and Sunday, ending at midnight on Sunday). It is Europe's largest flea market, with about 10,000 stalls and more than 1 million visitors.
Euralille shopping complex
Typical meals from this region include moules frites (oysters in cream sauce, served with French fries), waterzoï (a fish soup) and potjevlesh. These can be enjoyed with a Belgian beer, such as Leffe.
Seafood is a local speciality
The Musée des Beaux Arts (Place de la République) is considered to be one of the finest art museums in France outside Paris.
Paintings by Monet and Renoir are among the collections inside the palace. There are also displays of fine statues and ceramics.
Cathedrale Notre Dame de la Treille is a Catholic cathedral next to Place Gilleson. The façade was completed in 1999.
L'Opéra (in the Place du Théatre) opened in 1923 (replacing another theatre built in 1785 which burnt down). Both the interior and exterior are beautifully decorated.
Front of the opera house
La Vieille Bourse is the city's finest building, dating from about 1652. At that time Lille was part of the Netherlands: the two lions above the entrance gate are a symbol of this (in the centre you see the "fleur de lys", which is the city's emblem). Inside the cloister there are usually bookstalls. The stone engravings show a variety of interesting designs.
La Vielle Bourse
Strike a deal on hotels in Lille
Public transport
Between 4–13 October 1914, the troops in Lille were able to trick the enemy by convincing them that Lille possessed more artillery than was the case; in reality, the city had only a single cannon. Despite the deception, the German bombardments destroyed over 2,200 buildings and homes. When the Germans realised they had been tricked, they burned down an entire section of town, subsequently occupying the city. Lille was liberated by the British on 17 October 1918, when General Sir William Birdwood and his troops were welcomed by joyous crowds. The general was made an honorary citizen of the city of Lille on 28 October of that year.
Lille was also the hunting ground of World War I German flying Ace Max Immelmann who was nicknamed "the Eagle of Lille".
A local notable in this period was Évrard, who lived in the ninth century and participated in many of the day's political and military affairs.
From the twelfth century, the fame of the Lille cloth fair began to grow. In 1144 Saint-Sauveur parish was formed, which would give its name to the modern-day quartier Saint-Sauveur.
The counts of Flanders, Boulogne, and Hainaut came together with England and the Holy Roman Empire of Germany and declared war on France and Philip II of France, a war that ended with the French victory at Bouvines in 1214. Infante Ferdinand, Count of Flanders was imprisoned and the county fell into dispute: it would be his wife, Jeanne, Countess of Flanders and Constantinople, who ruled the city. She was said to be well-loved by the residents of Lille, who by that time numbered 10,000.
In 1224, the monk Bertrand of Rains, doubtlessly encouraged by local lords, tried to pass himself off as Baldwin I of Constantinople (the father of Jeanne of Flanders), who had disappeared at the battle of Adrianople. He pushed the kingdoms of Flanders and Hainaut towards sedition against Jeanne in order to recover his land. She called her cousin, Louis VIII ("The Lion"). He unmasked the imposter, whom Countess Jeanne quickly had hanged. In 1226 the King agreed to free Infante Ferdinand, Count of Flanders. Count Ferrand died in 1233, and his daughter Marie soon after. In 1235, Jeanne granted a city charter by which city governors would be chosen each All Saint's Day by four commissioners chosen by the ruler. On February 6, 1236, she founded the Countess's Hospital (L'hospice de la comtesse), which remains one of the most beautiful buildings in Old Lille. It was in her honor that the hospital of the Regional Medical University of Lille was named "Jeanne of Flanders Hospital" in the 20th century.
The Countess died in 1244 in the Abbey of Marquette, leaving no heirs. The rule of Flanders and Hainaut thus fell to her sister, Margaret II, Countess of Flanders, then to Margaret's son, Guy of Dampierre. Lille fell under the rule of France from 1304 to 1369, after the battle of Mons-en-Pévèle.
The county of Flanders fell to the Duchy of Burgundy next, after the 1369 marriage of Margaret III, Countess of Flanders, and Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. Lille thus became one of the three capitals of said Duchy, along with Brussels and Dijon. By 1445, Lille counted some 25,000 residents. Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, was even more powerful than the King of France, and made Lille an administrative and financial capital.
On 17 February 1454, one year after the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, Philip the Good organised a Pantagruelian banquet at his Lille palace, the still-celebrated "Feast of the Pheasant". There the Duke and his court undertook an oath to Christianity.
In 1477, at the death of the last duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold, Mary of Burgundy married Maximilian of Austria, who thus became Count of Flanders. At the end of the reign of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, Spanish Flanders fell to his eldest son, and thus under the rule of Philip II of Spain, King of Spain. The city remained under Spanish rule until the reign of Philip IV of Spain.
The legend of "Lydéric and Phinaert" puts the foundation of the city of "L'Isle" at 640. Although the first mention of the town appears in archives from the year 1066, some archeological digs seem to show the area as inhabited by as early as 2000 BC, most notably in the modern-day quartiers of Fives, Wazemmes, and Old Lille.
The original inhabitants of this region were the Gauls, such as the Menapians, the Morins, the Atrebates, and the Nervians, who were followed by Germanic peoples, the Saxons and the Frisians, and the Franks later.
From 830 until around 910, the Vikings invaded Flanders. After the destruction caused by Norman and Magyar invasion, the eastern part of the region fell under the eyes of the area's princes.
The name Lille comes from insula or l'Isla, i. "the island", since the area was at one time marshy. This name was used for the castle of the Counts of Flanders, built on dry land in the middle of the marsh.
The Count of Flanders controlled a number of old Roman cities (Boulogne, Arras, Cambrai) as well as some founded by the Carolingians (Valenciennes, Saint-Omer, Ghent, Bruges).
The County of Flanders thus extended to the left bank of the Scheldt, one of the richest and most prosperous regions of Europe.
