Antibes has much of historic reminiscence about it, though to-day its monuments are neither very numerous nor magnificent.
The old town was, for military reasons, surrounded with walls, and thus the sea was some distance from the centre of the town. Then, as to-day, to get a whiff of the sea, one had to leave the narrow tortuous picturesqueness of the old town behind and saunter on the quays of the little port, with its narrow entrance to the open sea.
There is little traffic of importance going on in the port of Antibes; mostly the shipping of the product of the potteries at Vallauris and neighbouring towns. Still, by no means is it an abandoned port; it is a popular haven for Mediterranean yachtsmen, and fishermen find it a suitable base for their operations in the open sea; so there is a constant going and coming such as gives a picturesque liveliness which is lacking at a mere resort or watering-place. Antibes is, moreover, a torpedo-boat station of the French navy, being safely sheltered by a line of rocks which parallel the coast-line for some distance just beyond the harbour’s mouth, and which are marked by a great iron buoy, known locally by the name of “Cinq Cent Francs.”
In the days of the Romans Antibes was probably the military port of Cimiez, and in a later day it came into the favour of both Henri IV. and Richelieu as a strongly fortified place. Later, Vauban came on the scene and surrounded its harbour with a great circular mole with considerable architectural pretensions. To-day the place is practically ignored as a military stronghold in favour of Villefranche and Toulon and the many intermediate batteries which have been erected.
The origin of the name of the town comes from the colony of Massaliotes who came here in the fifth century. Its modern name is a derivation from its earlier nomenclature, which became successively Antibon, Antibolus, and then Antiboul,—the Provençal name for the Antibes of the later French.
To-day one may see the remains of two ancient towers built by the Romans, and there are still evidences of the substructure of the antique theatre, built into the lower courses of some modern houses. In the walls of the Hôtel de Ville is a tablet reading as follows:
D. M.
PVERI SEPTENTRI
ONIS ANNORXI QUI
ANTIPOLI IN THEATRO