More about Soufflot

Several times over the past few days and weeks, I've mentioned the rue Soufflot in Paris, and in the heart of the Latin Quarter. I worked in the neighborhood back in the early 1970s. The Panthéon is where the street starts, and it ends at the Luxembourg palace and gardens. Look closely at the photo on the left below (by enlarging it) and you'll see there's another rue Soufflot in France, in a very different location.

Walt and I took a trip to Burgundy in October 2014. We stayed in a gîte near a beautiful village called Noyers-sur-Serein, and also not very far from the famous wine town of Chablis. On that trip, we also spent an afternoon in and around another wine village called Irancy. I know I had vaguely heard of it before, so I wanted to go there, but there was something I didn't know: Irancy's main street is the rue Soufflot. Why? Because that's where the architect of the Panthéon in Paris originally came from. Both the street in the Latin Quarter and the street in the Latin Quarter are named for him. I had no idea that Irancy was Jacques-Germain Soufflot's family home. He was born there in 1713.

Here's what the village of Irancy looks like. It is built in a natural basin and all around the edges of the basin are vineyards. The wine made there is a Pinot Noir red. We bought six bottles from a winery on the rue Soufflot (not in Paris), drank one or two of them with meals at our gîte and brought the rest of them back to Saint-Aignan to enjoy over the Christmas and New Year's holidays. By the way, J-G Soufflot passed away, unfortunately, before construction of the Panthéon in Paris was completed.