Le château du Prieuré (dessin F. Beaudouin)
A museum at the meeting point of “water paths”. Since the 19th century, Conflans Sainte Honorine has been the main meeting point of the navigable waterways of the northern part of France. Therefore the museum is set in a place strongly branded by its history and takes advantage of its location to interact with it.Even though a stroll along the banks of the rivers Seine and Oise is the obvious follow up to a visit of the museum, the national “Musée de la Batellerie” (Museum of River Navigation) is much more than a local museum.
Le Musée de la Batellerie (II) Museum of inland navigation
A historical museum of men, sciences and techniques.
Short history of the museum.
F. drawing B. Beaudouin appeared in Le Sueur, ” The Child in the museum ,” Les Cahiers du Batellerie Museum, No. 9, November 1983.
The Museum was born in 1967 thanks to Madame Louise Weiss. At that time, the historical, social and economical importance of inland navigation was completely neglected and its technological aspects thoroughly forgotten. The museum filled the gap and as it was the first of its kind managed in a few years to gather a stunning collection of items unique in France. A museum where the different kinds of inland navigation are dealt with. Today, the museum is the most important museum devoted to the history of inland navigation and the only one of national importance. The local collections have been gradually expanded with deposits from the State collections. Several major national museums granted Conflans with outstanding artefacts from the French national heritage. In 2005, fifteen remarkable models of engineering works taken from the inland navigation room of the late “Musée des Travaux Publics” (Public Works Museum) were thus included in the permanent exhibition. The collection of model boats (old building works, scientific lay-outs) is also worth being mentioned. Today, the museum meets its original target: showing all the different aspects of inland navigation throughout the ages.