Our focus here is not on the spectacular sights of the world's most famous city, but rather on identifying some of Dan Brown's descriptives. The Da Vinci Code's exhilarating and exhausting twenty-some hours of action takes place in Paris, London, and Edinburgh; however, the novel isn't trustworthy as a map any more than on history, theology, Scripture, art, architecture, or the life of Leonardo. See also map of Paris, page 202.

• Robert Langdon goes south past the Opera House to Place Vendome. In reality, to accomplish this, one would have to go north.
• Langdon recalls the original meridian running north from Sacre' Coeur to the River Seine, continuing to the Paris observatory. To accomplish this, reverse the direction, going south from Sacre' Coeur instead of north.
• To go from the Tuileries to the Louvre, don't go west (as Brown directs) but rather east.
• Also, Paris was not (as Brown contends) founded by the Merovingians, but by the Parisi, a Gallic tribe. Called Lutetia, it later was captured by Julius Caesar. The Merovingians did not rule Paris-and France-until the sixth century.