10 Best Sights in Paris, France

If it has to do with Parisian history, it's here: this fascinating hodgepodge of artifacts and art ranges from prehistoric canoes used by the Parisii tribes to the cork-lined bedroom where Marcel Proust labored over his evocative novels. Thanks to scores of paintings, drawings, photographs, furniture, and scale models, nowhere else in Paris can you get such a precise picture of the city's evolution through the ages. The museum fills more than 100 rooms in two adjacent mansions, the Hôtel Le Peletier de St-Fargeau and the Hôtel Carnavalet. The latter is a Renaissance jewel that was the home of writer Madame de Sévigné from 1677 to 1696. Throughout her long life, she wrote hundreds of frank and funny letters to her daughter in Provence, giving an incomparable view of both public and private life during the time of Louis XIV. The museum offers a glimpse into her world, but its collection covers far more than just the 17th century. The exhibits on the Revolution are especially interesting, with scale models of guillotines and a replica of the Bastille prison carved from one of its stones. Louis XVI's prison cell is reconstructed along with mementos of his life, even medallions containing locks of his family's hair. Other impressive interiors are reconstructed from the Middle Ages through the rococo period and into Art Nouveau—showstoppers include the Fouquet jewelry shop and the Café de Paris's original furnishings. From May through September, the museum's sculpted courtyard garden is home to Fabula café and restaurant, a delightful place for a coffee, snack, or meal in one of the Marais's prettiest gardens ( 16 rue des Francs-Bourgeois).

Built on the ruins of Roman baths, the Hôtel de Cluny has been a museum since medievalist Alexandre Du Sommerard established his collection here in 1844. The ornate 15th-century mansion was created for the abbot of Cluny, leader of the mightiest monastery in France. Symbols of the abbot's power surround the building, from the crenellated walls that proclaimed his independence from the king to the carved Burgundian grapes twining up the entrance that symbolize his valuable vineyards. The scallop shells (coquilles St-Jacques) covering the facade are a symbol of religious pilgrimage, another important source of income for the abbot; the well-traveled pilgrimage route to Spain once ran around the corner along Rue St-Jacques. The highlight of the museum's collection is the world-famous La Dame à la Licorne (The Lady and the Unicorn) tapestry series, woven in the 16th century, probably in Belgium, and now presented in refurbished surroundings. The vermillion tapestries are an allegorical representation of the five senses. In each, a unicorn and a lion surround an elegant young woman against an elaborate mille fleurs (literally, "a thousand flowers") background. The enigmatic sixth tapestry is thought to be either a tribute to a sixth sense, perhaps intelligence, or a renouncement of the other senses; "To my only desire" is inscribed at the top. The collection also includes the original sculpted heads of the Kings of Israel and Judah from Notre-Dame, decapitated during the Revolution and discovered in 1977 in the basement of a French bank. The frigidarium is a stunning reminder of the city's cold-water Roman baths; the soaring space, painstakingly renovated, houses temporary exhibits. Also notable is the pocket-size chapel with its elaborate Gothic ceiling. Outside, in Place Paul Painlevé, is a charming medieval-style garden where you can see flora depicted in the unicorn tapestries. The English video guide (€4) is highly recommended. For a different kind of visual and auditory experience, check the event listings; concerts of medieval music are often staged in the evening, Sunday afternoons, and Monday at lunchtime.

The first installation in this compelling memorial and museum is the deeply moving Wall of Names, tall plinths honoring the 76,000 French Jews deported from France to Nazi concentration camps, of whom only 2,500 survived. Opened in 2005, the center has an archive on the victims, a library, and a gallery hosting temporary exhibitions. The permanent collection includes riveting artifacts and photographs from the camps, along with video testimony from survivors. The children's memorial is particularly poignant and not for the faint of heart—scores of backlit photographs show the faces of many of the 11,000 murdered French children. The crypt, a giant black marble Star of David, contains ashes recovered from the camps and the Warsaw ghetto. You can see the orderly drawers containing small files on Jews kept by the French police. (France officially acknowledged the Vichy government's role only in 1995.) The history of anti-Semitic persecution in the world is revisited, as well as the rebounding state of Jewry today. There is a free guided tour in English the second Sunday of every month at 3.

This excellent museum traces the tempestuous backstory of French and European Jews through art and history. Housed in the refined 17th-century Hôtel St-Aignan, exhibits have good explanatory texts in English, but the free English audio guide adds another layer of insight; guided tours in English are also available on request (€4 extra). Highlights include 13th-century tombstones excavated in Paris; a wooden model of a destroyed Eastern European synagogue; a roomful of early paintings by Marc Chagall; and Christian Boltanski's stark two-part tribute to Shoah (Holocaust) victims in the form of plaques on an outer wall naming the (mainly Jewish) inhabitants of the Hôtel St-Aignan in 1939, and canvas hangings with the personal data of the 13 residents who were deported and died in concentration camps. The museum also mounts excellent temporary exhibitions, like the recent "Chagall, Modigliani, Soutine: Paris as a School, 1940." The rear-facing windows offer a view of the Jardin Anne Frank. To visit the garden, use the entrance on Impasse Berthaud, off Rue Beaubourg, just north of Rue Rambuteau.

Mark this down as one of Paris's most distinctive—and fascinating—collections around the theme of "humans and nature." The museum, housed in the gorgeous 17th-century Hôtel de Guénégaud, features lavishly appointed rooms stocked with animal- and hunt-theme art and sculpture by the likes of Rubens and Gentileschi, as well as antique weaponry and taxidermy interspersed with contemporary works by artists such as Jeff Koons, Sophie Calle, and Walton Ford. In a tribute to Art Nouveau, the decor incorporates chandeliers and railings curled like antlers. Older kids will appreciate the jaw-dropping Trophy Room's impressive menagerie of beasts, not to mention the huge polar bear stationed outside. There is a lovely multimedia exhibit on the myth of the unicorn, as well as charming interactive displays on antique weaponry and bird calls. Temporary exhibits take place on the first floor, with works scattered throughout the permanent collection. There's also a spacious café.

Louis XVI transferred the royal Mint to this imposing mansion in the late 18th century. It was moved again (to Pessac, near Bordeaux) in 1973; however, weights and measures, medals, and limited-edition coins are still made here, and the site houses a museum devoted to currency. There is an extensive collection of coins and related artifacts, plus workshops where you can watch artisans in action as they mint, mold, sculpt, polish, and engrave using century-old techniques. Public spaces host cultural programs and temporary contemporary art exhibitions. Check the website for Wednesday and Saturday afternoon craft workshops for children. The museum is also home to the three-star Guy Savoy restaurant (reservations required:  [email protected]) and the simpler Café Frappé par Bloom.

Designed by Claude-Nicolas Ledoux in the late 18th century, this landmark structure was originally built as a customs station for merchandise entering Paris. It's now home to a museum dedicated to the French heroes of the resistance during World War II (including Jean Moulin and General Leclerc) and the liberation of Paris. The museum features a fascinating collection of historic memorabilia, photographs, documents, and video archives.

When President Jacques Chirac’s legacy project (the Musée du Quai Branly, dedicated to the world’s indigenous arts and cultures) pilfered half of this museum's pieces, few thought the rest of Paris’s storied anthropology museum would survive, but it has come roaring back to life. Focused on “science and human societies,” the Musée de l’Homme has 33,368 square feet of sparkling exhibition space in the west wing of the Palais de Chaillot, where it displays more than 700,000 prehistoric artifacts and art objects. It now uses the most modern museum tricks—including interactive displays, 3D projections, and educational games—to help visitors understand the history of the human species. While you’re admiring the 25,000-year-old Venus of Lespugue or comparing the skull of Cro-Magnon man with that of René Descartes, don’t forget to look out the window: the view from the upper floors across to the Eiffel Tower and southern Paris is spectacular.

A must for military-history buffs, the National Museum of the Legion of Honor is dedicated to French and foreign military leaders. Housed in an elegant mansion just across from the Musée d'Orsay, it features a broad collection of military decorations dating from as early as the First Crusade in the 11th century, themed paintings, and video tributes to various luminaries—including U.S. general Dwight Eisenhower, a Légion member who led the Allied liberation of France in 1944. The palatial complex was completed in 1788 and acquired by the Legion of Honor in 1804.

If your knowledge of Paris history is nul (nil), stop here for an entertaining free tutorial. Built in 1879 as a private museum, the Pavillon today is a restored structure of glass and iron that showcases the city's urban development through the ages. A giant model of Paris traces its evolution (with information in English). There are photos, maps, and videos, plus a giant digital interactive model detailing what Paris is predicted to look like in the future. Reconstruction plans—called Grand Paris—are vast and take into account the 2024 Olympics and beyond. The Pavillon also has a café-bookstore and hosts frequent architecture-theme temporary exhibits.