The geographical focus of a visit to Dijon is inevitably the seat of its former rulers, the Palais des Ducs , which stands precisely at the hub of the city overlooking Mansart's perfectly proportioned and serene place de la Libération , built towards the end of the seventeenth century as place Royale to show off a statue of the Sun King. Though still functioning as the town hall, the palace's exterior has undergone so many alterations - especially in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries when it became Burgundy's parliament - that the dukes themselves would scarcely recognize it. The only outward reminders of the older building that stood here are the fourteenth-century Tour de Bar above the east wing, which now houses the Musée des Beaux-Arts, and the fifteenth-century Tour Philippe-le-Bon , which is unfortunately closed for an indefinite period.

The excellent Musée des Beaux-Arts (daily except Tues & public hols 10am-6pm; 32F/¬4.88, Sun free) houses an impressive collection of paintings, representing many different schools and periods, from Titian, Rubens and Schongauer to Manet, Monet and other Impressionists, with substantial numbers of Italian and Flemish works and quantities of religious artefacts, ivories and tapestries. One of the most interesting exhibits is a small room devoted to the intricate woodcarving of the sixteenth-century designer and architect Hugues Sambin, whose work appears throughout the old quarter of the city in the massive doors and facades of the aristocratic hôtels . Visiting the museum also provides the opportunity to see the surviving portions of the original ducal palace, including the vast kitchens needed to service the dukes' gargantuan appetites, and the magnificent Salle des Gardes , richly appointed with panelling, tapestries and a minstrels' gallery. Here are displayed the tombs from the Chartreuse de Champmol of Philippe le Hardi and Jean sans Peur and his wife, Marguerite de Bavière. Both follow the same pattern: painted effigies of the dead, attended by angels holding their helmets and heraldic shields, and accompanied by a cortege of brilliantly sculpted mourners.