Saint-Malo is a granite walled port city on the north coast of Brittany, named after a…

Saint-Malo is a granite walled port city on the north coast of Brittany, named after a Welsh monk called Maclow who crossed the Channel in the 6th century. It became the home of France’s corsairs, state-licensed pirates who terrorised English shipping and brought back fortunes from the East Indies and the Americas. Jacques Cartier sailed from here in 1534 and claimed Canada for France. From 1590 to 1594 it even declared itself an independent republic, with the motto “not French, not Breton, but Malouin.” The old city was almost completely destroyed by Allied bombing in 1944 and rebuilt stone by stone over the next two decades to look exactly as it had before.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​