The quartier de la Banasterie , lying behind the Palais des Papes, is almost solid seventeenth- and eighteenth-century, and the heavy wooden doors, with their highly sculptured lintels, today bear the nameplates of lawyers, psychiatrists and doctors.

 

Between Banasterie and place des Carmes are a tangle of tiny streets guaranteed to get you lost. Pedestrians have priority over cars on many of them, and there are plenty of tempting café or restaurant stops. At 24 rue Saluces, you'll find the peculiar Musée du Mont de Piété , an ex-pawnbroker's shop and now home to the town's archives (Mon-Fri 8.30-11.30am & 1.30-5.30pm; free). It has a small display of papal bulls and painted silk desiccators for determining the dry weight of what was the city's chief commodity.