The centuries passed and it was the Phoceans who discovered this rich, prosperous region favoured by a temperate climate in the C.11th B.C. It was this foreign impetus that gave rise to the towns of Baix, in Ardèche or Saint-Jean-de-Muzols.

And then it was the turn of the Romans. These great administrators soon understood the extreme importance of a region that everything seemed to predestine to become a second Rome. Between the first century B.C. and the C.3rd , these " civilizers " provided the region with a dense network of roads. The Rhone became an essential trading route, first of all for the import, then the export of the luxury articles that the region has always known how to produce. Without taking into account the fact that these Roman roads went as far as what is Brittany today and " Hispania "(Spain). It must be said, these Romans certainly had what it took !
Then, as everything comes to an end one day, this prosperity crumbled with the terrifying arrival of the barbarians, the Francs, Huns and Burgondians. They all came by and dealt a death-blow to this powerful region.. Without mentioning the Roman Empire which suffered more than just a serious set-back.

As a result, the Middle Ages gradually settled over this land in need of rebuilding. Little by little its lost prosperity regained its former vigour. In the C.14th silk made its appearance in the Rhône-Alpes region. Needless to say this trade was crowned with success. Lyons silk was even exported to the French kings. In the C.16th the town of Lyons gained the privilege of being the only silk warehouse in the kingdom of François 1er .
From that moment on the region has never stopped producing brilliant inventors : Olivier de Serre, Monsieur Jacquard, the Lumière brothers and others who have made this region a champion of new technologies and scientific research.

Today the region is still characterised by its dynamic economy. And continuing in the wake of its ancestors, it continues combining trade and science.