The destructive hand of man and the
assaults of the Rhone have dealt hardly with St. Benezet's work. Ruined
during the siege of 1226, it was repaired in 1234-37, and in 1349 knit to
the papal fortress at the Avignon end. In 1352, when Clement VI. rebuilt
four of the arches, it is described as of stone and wood; it was cut
during the siege of Benedict XIII., and repaired, or rebuilt, in 1418 and
1430; in 1602 three arches collapsed; in 1633 two more fell, and in 1650
the gaps were bridged by wooden struts and planks, which were carried away
in 1670 by ice-floes.
Owing to the interminable dispute between the monarchy and the papacy as
to liability for its repair, each power claiming jurisdiction over the
Rhone, all attempts to preserve it from ruin were abandoned in 1680, when
Louis XIV. refused either to allow the legates to take toll for the
necesary repairs, or to undertake them himself.
Little is known of the original bridge, which consisted of twenty-two
semi-circular arches (Viollet-le-Duc gives eighteen), much lower than the
present elliptic ones, which date back to the thirteenth century,
according to Labaude--or to the fifteenth century, acording to other
authorities--when the bridge, having proved too low-pitched, was raised to
its present level, and the flood arches over the piles were built.
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