Ancien Couvent des Cordeliers

In 1259, a Franciscan convent (at the time, people called it Cordeliers) was built between the rue Hennequin and the rue des Cordeliers. Starting in the 15th century, and until the completion of the Hôtel de ville in 1673, the bourgeois held their assemblies there.

The Cordeliers convent also housed the first library open to the public in Troyes, one of the oldest in France. In 1651, the canon Jacques Hennequin (1575-1661) bequeathed his library of 4,700 volumes, on the condition that they would be made available to “all those who wished to enter… on Monday, Wednesday andFriday throughout the year”. Hennequin was buried in the Cordeliers chapel. His monumental headstone, can be seen in the permanent exhibition entitled (a thousand yearsof books at Troyes) at the Médiathèque de l’agglomération troyenne.
Today, the site is occupied by a prison.