Coverage France
Audio Guide Vienne
app, one-time €4.99
Vienne sits on the Rhône south of Lyon with one of the densest concentrations of Roman monuments in France: a near-intact temple, a 14,000-seat theatre, and a pyramid that once marked the spine of a chariot-racing circus. Two millennia of history are layered into a compact city that rewards slow walks between hills and riverbanks.
13+ researched places in the app
Yes. Parroo is a self-guided audio guide for Vienne: 13 researched places, from Temple of Augustus and Livia to Ancient Theatre of Vienne and Saint-Maurice Cathedral, each with a short summary, a full article, and a roughly three-minute audio story in German, English, and French. Buy once, no subscription, no booking. Start whenever you like.
Audio sample: Temple of Augustus and Livia
Vienne
Places researched in this city
A selection of the 13 places we've researched in this city. The full set is in the Parroo app.
- Roman monuments
- Romanesque cloisters
- Medieval hilltops
- Archaeological museums
- Riverside walks
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01
Temple of Augustus and Livia
This Corinthian temple survived the centuries by reinventing itself: it served as a church, then a courthouse, before becoming one of France's first listed historic monuments in 1840. Built in the early 1st century BC on Vienne's forum, it remains one of the best-preserved Roman temples in existence.
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02
Ancient Theatre of Vienne
Built between 40 and 50 CE into the slopes of Pipet hill, this theatre once held up to 14,000 spectators; today it holds 7,500 and still hosts live performances each summer for the Jazz à Vienne festival. The esplanade above it once housed temples and divine statues, making the whole hillside a kind of sacred civic complex.
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03
Saint-Maurice Cathedral
The Council of Vienne met inside these walls in 1311 and 1312, ultimately dissolving the Knights Templar, one of the most dramatic ecclesiastical decisions of the medieval era. The cathedral itself spans styles from Romanesque capitals to a flamboyant Gothic façade, built over a Christian site that dates back to the 4th century.
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04
Museum and Archaeological Sites of Saint-Romain-en-Gal
Discovered only in 1967 during construction of a school, this 7-hectare site across the Rhône turned out to be an entire Roman residential and artisan quarter, complete with remarkable floor mosaics. The museum that opened in 1996 displays around 1,160 objects from a collection of 4,000.
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05
Pyramid of the Roman Circus
A 23-metre masonry pyramid standing in the middle of Vienne is not what most visitors expect, and it is the only such structure in France. It marked the central spine of a chariot-racing circus roughly 460 metres long, built in the late 2nd century AD with a deliberate Egyptianising style.
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06
Archaeological Garden of Cybele
Hidden in plain sight as a public garden with 1,200 rose bushes, this site preserves the remains of a Julio-Claudian forum, portico arcades, and a large limestone wall that may have been Vienne's curia. It was only classified as a Monument Historique in 2012, and free entry means most people walk through without realising what is underfoot.
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07
Church and Cloister of Saint-André-le-Bas
The Romanesque cloister here is the only fully preserved one in the entire Rhône-Alpes region, yet it draws a fraction of the crowds that the Roman monuments do. Founded in the 6th century, the abbey reached its peak influence in the 11th and 12th centuries, confirmed by a papal bull from Pope Calixtus II in 1120.
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08
6 more places to discover
In the Parroo app
Good to know
13 researched places, from the Temple of Augustus and Livia and the Ancient Theatre to lesser-known spots like the Archaeological Garden of Cybele. Each one has a short summary, a full article, and a ~3-minute audio story.
Yes. Every place has a ~3-minute audio story, written from the perspective of a guide standing next to you and produced with premium narration, not the article read aloud.
German, English, and French. Pick whichever you'd rather read or listen in.
No booking, no signup. It's a self-guided walk you start whenever you like. You do need a connection for now to stream the audio and load articles; offline support is something we're still building.
A one-time €4.99 for the whole city, no subscription and no recurring cost. You buy Vienne once and keep access to all 13 places with text and audio.
Open this city in Parroo
Get the full articles, audio stories, and map for this city in the Parroo app. One payment per geography. Yours to keep.
Updated: 2026-09-25