John Reps Collection - Bastides
About this collection
This collection features images of bastides, market towns created in 13th Century southwestern France designed primarily to return a profit to their sponsors as well as concentrating the population in secure places for ease of administration. Their founders were the great feudal lords of the region: kings, dukes, counts and viscounts. Unlike most other towns of the period, the bastide church did not occupy the most prominent site. For more information, see Bastides – An Introduction on eCommons.
Historical context
John Reps (1921-2020) was Professor of City and Regional Planning at Cornell University. He received his B.A. from Dartmouth College in 1943 and a Masters of Regional Planning from Cornell University in 1947. He began to explore and photograph bastides in 1951. This digital collection of images records what he saw then and on five later visits that document the appearance of these unusual examples of medieval urban design.
Using the collection
The items in this collection are geocoded and can be browsed by location.
For more information about the collection, please contact the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections at rareref@cornell.edu.
More information
- Collection steward
- Katherine Reagan, Ernest L. Stern '56 Curator of Rare Books & Manuscripts
- Metadata creation
- Cornell University Library
- Funding
- Cornell University Library
- Credits
- This collection overview was excerpted from an exhibit featuring these materials and last reviewed in 2025.
- Collection sources
- Exhibits featuring items from this collection