Many vestiges, especially 2 graves from the Cardial period attest that Avignon was occupied since the year 3000 BC. The Chassean civilization which followed was the first builder of the town.
Around the year 2000 BC., an important Neolithic town, covering several hectares, extended on the slope of the Rocher des Doms and the banks of the Rhone. The site had already had many occupations since those times, that Avignon could be considered as one of the most ancient towns in Europe

The prehistory museum

In discharge now-a-days, it is a department of Calvet museum. It is specialized with the origins of the human occupation of the Vaucluse county since the Paleolithic era. It conserves the main elements of the prehistory in Avignon , in particular the two graves discovered in the city in1965 and in 1974, in which the tissue and the use of the red ochre , permit to tell that they belong to IVith millenium before our era. It conserves as well, important furniture, flints and tools from the Chassean period ( 3000 years BC ), also an important collection ofAnthropomorphic steles

Tombstone of the Rocher des Doms (Calvet museum)
Discovered on the Rocher des Doms, in 1961, it is a part of what is called the Provençal group with 30 samples known until now. These Anthropomorphic steles represent a dead person or the death in general belong the Megalithic current which came to its best during the Chalcolithic era. On the other hand, the absence of the solar sign on it, made the discovered stele as the first witness of the Avignonese art, which is unique.

An ancient tow

The city went through the ages. After it had been a Celto-Ligurian capital, a Phocaean colony, it had its own money with its name on it, AOYE, then it became a romanesque city. The antic Avenio, used to cover a surface of 46 hectares, the exhumed elements witness a wealthy city, even if the architecture (because of the ages) did not leave many apparent elements. Known as one of 80 cities of Gaul under the Emperor August, a Latin colony under Claude, then it was promoted to the grade of Roman city during the IIth century under Hadrien.
Its population went up until 27 000 inhabitants. During the Barbarian invasions which accompanied the fall of the Roman Empire, Avignon withdrew to shelter around the rock. It became an advanced castle with the Burgond kingdom, its history was long series of shares, wars and bleeding sieges until the XIIth century.

The Lapidaire Museum

This museum occupies the Jesuits Chapel, a splendid baroque edifice. It conserves Egyptian, Gallo-Roman, early Christian and medieval sculptures, vases, antic glassware. Many of the Avignon vestiges are this museum.