The Town
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Roman theater

Days off in Orange circa 55 AD were most entertainingly spent from dawn to dusk watching farce, clownish improvisations, song and dance, and occasionally, for the sake of a visiting dignitary, a bit of Greek tragedy in Latin at the huge Roman theatre (daily: April–Sept 9am–6.30pm; Oct–March 9am–noon & 1.30–5.30pm; €7, including audioguide and combined ticket with museum), built into the hill which squats on the south side of the old town. The acoustics allowed a full audience of 9000 to hear every word. The hill of St-Eutrope, into which the seats were built, plus a vast awning strung from the top of the stage wall, protected the spectators from the weather. It is one of the best-preserved examples in existence, with its stage wall still standing 103m across and 36m high, and completely plain like some monstrous prison wall when you see it from outside. The interior, although missing much of its original decoration, has its central, larger-than-life-size statue of Augustus, and niches for lesser statues.

The best view of the theatre in its entirety is from St-Eutrope hill. You can follow a path up the hill either from the top of cours Aristide-Briand (montée P. de Chalons) or from cours Pourtoules (montée Albert Lambert) until you are looking directly down onto the stage. The ruins around your feet are those of the short-lived seventeenth-century castle of the princes of Orange. Louis XIV had it destroyed in 1673 and the principality of Orange was officially annexed to France forty years later.

The municipal museum, across the road from the theatre entrance (daily: April–Sept 9.30am–7pm; Oct–March 9.30am–noon & 1.30–5.30pm; €7 combined ticket with theatre), has documents concerning the Orange dynasty, including a suitably austere portrait of the founder of the Netherlands, William "the Silent". It also has Roman bits and pieces and a collection rotated on a yearly basis containing diverse items such as the contents of a seventeenth-century pharmacy and an unlikely selection of works by Frank Brangwyn, a Welsh painter who had no connections with Orange.

If you've arrived by road from the north you'll have passed the town's second major Roman monument, the Arc de Triomphe, whose intricate frieze and relief celebrates imperial victories against the Gauls. It was built around 20 BC outside the town walls to recall the victories of the Roman Second Legion.

Orange's old town is very small, hemmed in between the theatre and the River Meyne, featuring some pretty fountain-adorned squares and houses with ancient porticoes and courtyards.