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Georg Braun and Frans Hogenberg, Aerial view of Paris in the Civitates orbis terrarum (Cologne, 1572). Image credit: Rubenstein Library at Duke University, https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4h41rn8z.
Georg Braun and Frans Hogenberg, Aerial view of Paris in the Civitates orbis terrarum (Cologne, 1572). Image credit: Rubenstein Library at Duke University, https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4h41rn8z.

Paris of Waters

Focusing on the impact of water on the demographic, social, architectural, and urban development of the city of Paris through time.

Project Lead(s): Sara Galletti

2014present

Paris of Waters is on hold while Professor Galletti is on leave.

Paris of Waters is a research project that focuses on the impact of water on the demographic, social, architectural, and urban development of the city of Paris through time. The project is concerned with water in a wide array of forms—as resource, as commodity, as means of transportation, as funnel for the city ‘s waste, and as cause of disaster and death—and with making it visible as a powerful agent of urban change. Paris of Waters challenges traditional urban history narratives—which tend to focus on design, monumentality, and the stylistic features of the built environment—by highlighting the role of infrastructure, underground works, and hydraulic management and engineering as defining elements of a city’s development and history.

Banner Image: Georg Braun and Frans Hogenberg, Aerial view of Paris in the Civitates orbis terrarum (Cologne, 1572). Image credit: Rubenstein Library at Duke University, https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4h41rn8z

Past Collaborators

Thomas Aubert
Gaby Bloom
Ronan Bouttier
Andrew Lin
Dryden Quigley
Irene Zhou
Amanda Lazarus
Hanna Wiegers

Scholarship

Presentations

  • Galletti, Sara. “Paris of Waters.” Institut français d’archéologie orientale (IFAO). Cairo, Egypt. May 3, 2019. Galletti, Sara. “Paris of Waters.” John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute. Duke University. February 7, 2019.