This wooden bridge was destroyed forty years later in 1226 during the Albigensian Crusade when Louis VIII of France laid siege to Avignon.

The bridge was abandoned in the mid-17th century as the arches tended to collapse each time the Rhône flooded, making it very expensive to maintain.

The Chapel of Saint Nicholas which sits on the second pier of the bridge, was constructed in the second half of 12th century but has since been substantially altered.

The position of the islands in the 13th century is not well documented but a 17th-century map shows that the southern end of the Île de la Barthelasse was upstream of the bridge.

[8] The arches were liable to collapse when the river flooded and were sometimes replaced with temporary wooden structures before being rebuilt in stone.

[6] The only other visible vestige of the bridge is some masonry from pier 11 that is attached to a private building on the Île de la Barthelasse.

[6] The locations of piers 9 and 10, both now on the Île de la Barthelasse, were confirmed by cores drilled at their expected positions.

Just below the masonry, at a depth of around 6.7 m (22 ft 0 in), wooden fragments, identified as silver fir (Abies alba), were recovered.

Convinced that the work was ordained by God, wealthy patrons formed the first “Bridge-Building Brotherhood” to fund Bénézet's endeavor.

At a later date, perhaps as early as the 13th century when the level of the bridge was raised, a floor supported by a ribbed quadripartite vault was inserted into the structure.

A side door was created in the lower chapel as the stonework of the raised bridge blocked the original entrance.

In 1715 the confraternity of boatmen built a chapel on dry land on the Avignon side of the bridge outside the city walls next to the gatehouse.

The bridge had great strategic importance as when first built it was the only fixed river crossing between Lyon and the Mediterranean Sea.

The right bank, which was controlled by the French crown, was overlooked by the fortress of the Tour Philippe-le-Bel which was built at the beginning of the 14th century.

At very low water, stone blocks were visible which were larger than those above and had features that appeared foreign to the existing bridge.

The article described a survey undertaken in 1969 on the surviving vestiges of the piers in the Villeneuve branch of the river before their total destruction by the Compagnie Nationale du Rhône (CNR).

The article also included long quotes from an unpublished report by Mr Mathian, an engineer working for the CNR, on a survey carried out in 1965 on the four intact piers on the Avignon side of the river.

A sample of the wood was dated by the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) using the radiocarbon technique to between 290 and 530 AD, corresponding to the end of the Roman Empire.

[39] During the dredging of the Villeneuve channel the remains of three large wooden piles were recovered, two of which were still shod with iron tips.

[40] The archaeologist Dominique Carru, while accepting the radiocarbon date for the sample of wood, argued in 1999 that it is very unlikely that an earlier bridge existed.

The main east–west route in the Roman period passed through Tarascon-Beaucaire, 20 km (12 mi) to the south, and avoided the river at Avignon which was wide and variable in position.

[43] The modern version of the song dates from the mid-19th century when Adolphe Adam included it in the opéra comique Le Sourd ou l'Auberge pleine which was first performed in Paris in 1853.