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71-499: The Cévennes ( / s eɪ ˈ v ɛ n / say- VEN , French: [sevɛn] ; Occitan : Cevenas IPA: [seβeno̞s] ) is a cultural region and range of mountains in south-central France , on the south-east edge of the Massif Central . It covers parts of the départements of Ardèche , Gard , Hérault and Lozère . Rich in geographical, natural, and cultural significance, portions of

142-553: A common origin (see Occitano-Romance languages ). The language was one of the first to gain prestige as a medium for literature among Romance languages in the Middle Ages. Indeed, in the 12th and 13th centuries, Catalan troubadours such as Guerau de Cabrera , Guilhem de Bergadan, Guilhem de Cabestany, Huguet de Mataplana , Raimon Vidal de Besalú, Cerverí de Girona , Formit de Perpinhan, and Jofre de Foixà wrote in Occitan. At

213-643: A consonant), whereas the southernmost dialects have more features in common with the Ibero-Romance languages (e.g. betacism ; voiced fricatives between vowels in place of voiced stops; - ch - in place of - it -), and Gascon has a number of unusual features not seen in other dialects (e.g. /h/ in place of /f/ ; loss of /n/ between vowels; intervocalic -r- and final -t/ch in place of medieval - ll -). There are also significant lexical differences, where some dialects have words cognate with French, and others have Catalan and Spanish cognates. Nonetheless, there

284-542: A dialect of French spoken by Jews in southern France. Southern Jewish French is now estimated to only be spoken by about 50–100 people. Domergue Sumien proposes a slightly different supradialectal grouping. Parc national des C%C3%A9vennes Created in 1970, the park has its administrative seat in Florac at Florac Castle . It is located mainly in the departments of Lozère and Gard ; it also covers some parts of Ardèche and Aveyron , therefore stretching across

355-564: A fortified city then under English occupation. French Protestants , also called the Huguenots , were established in the Cévennes by the beginning of the 16th century. They were often persecuted and lacked the freedom to worship openly, so they kept away from cities. They worshiped in deserted wilderness areas: forests, caves, and gullies. The Edict of Nantes in 1598 gave some relief and freedom of worship to Protestants but also concentrated

426-746: A part of a wider Occitano-Romanic group. One such classification posits three groups: According to this view, Catalan is an ausbau language that became independent from Occitan during the 13th century, but originates from the Aquitano-Pyrenean group. Occitan has 3 dialects spoken by Jewish communities that are all now extinct. A sociolect of the Gascon dialect spoken by Spanish and Portuguese Jews in Gascony . It, like many other Jewish dialects and languages, contained large amounts of Hebrew loanwords. It went extinct after World War 2 with

497-451: A record number of departments for a national park. The Aven Armand cave is located in the park. In 2011, the Park was made a part of The Causses and the Cévennes, Mediterranean agro-pastoral Cultural Landscape UNESCO World Heritage Site . [REDACTED] The park includes several mountains and plateaus, including: Mont Lozère , Mont Aigoual , Causse Méjean , France . Mont Lozère is

568-540: A second Occitan immigration of this period was assimilated by the similar Navarro-Aragonese language , which at the same time was fostered and chosen by the kings of Aragon . In the 14th century, Occitan across the whole southern Pyrenean area fell into decay and became largely absorbed into Navarro-Aragonese first and Castilian later in the 15th century, after their exclusive boroughs broke up (1423, Pamplona 's boroughs unified). Gascon-speaking communities were called to move in for trading purposes by Navarrese kings in

639-542: A single written standard form, nor does it have official status in France, home to most of its speakers. Instead, there are competing norms for writing Occitan, some of which attempt to be pan-dialectal, whereas others are based on a particular dialect. These efforts are hindered by the rapidly declining use of Occitan as a spoken language in much of southern France, as well as by the significant differences in phonology and vocabulary among different Occitan dialects. According to

710-696: A thick limestone covering, with only the tops of the Cévennes protruding as islands in the Jurassic sea. This in turn was eroded, The Cévennes forms the watershed between the Atlantic and Mediterranean. In late Cretaceous and early Tertiary times further mountain building occurred. The Alpine orogeny lifted and deformed the Alps and the Pyrenees though the Massif Central acted as a rigid block, and

781-476: A unitary language, as it lacks an official written standard . Like other languages that fundamentally exist at a spoken, rather than written, level (e.g. the Rhaeto-Romance languages , Franco-Provençal , Astur-Leonese , and Aragonese ), every settlement technically has its own dialect, with the whole of Occitania forming a classic dialect continuum that changes gradually along any path from one side to

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852-625: A written account in Occitan from Pamplona centered on the burning of borough San Nicolas from 1258, while the History of the War of Navarre by Guilhem Anelier (1276), albeit written in Pamplona, shows a linguistic variant from Toulouse . Things turned out slightly otherwise in Aragon, where the sociolinguistic situation was different, with a clearer Basque-Romance bilingual situation (cf. Basques from

923-410: Is "probably not more divergent from Occitan overall than Gascon is". There is no general agreement about larger groupings of these dialects. Max Wheeler divides the dialects into two groups: Pierre Bec divides the dialects into three groups: In order to overcome the pitfalls of the traditional romanistic view, Bec proposed a "supradialectal" classification that groups Occitan with Catalan as

994-631: Is a Romance language spoken in Southern France , Monaco , Italy 's Occitan Valleys , as well as Spain 's Val d'Aran in Catalonia ; collectively, these regions are sometimes referred to as Occitania . It is also spoken in Calabria ( Southern Italy ) in a linguistic enclave of Cosenza area (mostly Guardia Piemontese ). Some include Catalan in Occitan, as the linguistic distance between this language and some Occitan dialects (such as

1065-464: Is a significant amount of mutual intelligibility . Gascon is the most divergent, and descriptions of the main features of Occitan often consider Gascon separately. Max Wheeler notes that "probably only its copresence within the French cultural sphere has kept [Gascon] from being regarded as a separate language", and compares it to Franco-Provençal, which is considered a separate language from Occitan but

1136-585: Is related to the Breton word kein meaning back. The - vennes part of the name is likely related to the Gaelic word beinn meaning mountain or hill. There are several popular false etymologies, one of which is that the name is derived for the words seven veins ( sept veines in French) which is supposed to be a reference to the seven rivers (veins) flowing through the region. Historical references to

1207-413: Is the other native language. Up to seven million people in France understand the language, whereas twelve to fourteen million fully spoke it in 1921. In 1860 , Occitan speakers represented more than 39% of the whole French population (52% for francophones proper); they were still 26% to 36% in the 1920s and fewer than 7% in 1993. Occitan is fundamentally defined by its dialects, rather than being

1278-467: Is worthier and better suited for romances and pastourelles ; but [the language] from Limousin is of greater value for writing poems and cançons and sirventés ; and across the whole of the lands where our tongue is spoken, the literature in the Limousin language has more authority than any other dialect, wherefore I shall use this name in priority. The term Provençal , though implying a reference to

1349-527: The òc language (Occitan), the oïl language (French), and the sì language (Italian). The word òc came from Vulgar Latin hoc ("this"), while oïl originated from Latin hoc illud ("this [is] it"). Old Catalan and now the Catalan of Northern Catalonia also have hoc ( òc ). Other Romance languages derive their word for "yes" from the Latin sic , "thus [it is], [it

1420-640: The Romance of Flamenca (13th century), the Song of the Albigensian Crusade (1213–1219?), Daurel e Betó (12th or 13th century), Las, qu'i non-sun sparvir, astur (11th century) and Tomida femina (9th or 10th century). Occitan was the vehicle for the influential poetry of the medieval troubadours ( trobadors ) and trobairitz : At that time, the language was understood and celebrated throughout most of educated Europe. It

1491-614: The Averne Confederation . The Visigoths took control of the western half of Gallia Narbonensis in 462 CE, a part known as Septimania which included Le Vigan, and they retained control despite attempts in 586 and 589 CE when the Frankish , Merovingian King Guntram attempted to conquer the area from the north. In 587 the region came under Catholic rule with the conversion of the Visigoth king Reccared I . In 719,

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1562-595: The Gascon language ) is similar to the distance between different Occitan dialects. Catalan was considered a dialect of Occitan until the end of the 19th century and still today remains its closest relative. Occitan is an official language of Catalonia, Spain, where a subdialect of Gascon known as Aranese is spoken (in the Val d'Aran ). Since September 2010, the Parliament of Catalonia has considered Aranese Occitan to be

1633-760: The Lozère and the Gard. The Parc national des Cévennes is almost entirely within Lozère. The principal towns and villages of the Cévennes are Alès , Le Vigan , Sumène , Valleraugue , Ganges, Hérault , Saint-Hippolyte-du-Fort , Sauve , Lasalle , Saint-André-de-Valborgne , Saint-Jean-du-Gard , Anduze , Florac , Saint-Germain-de-Calberte , le Pont-de-Montvert , Villefort , Génolhac , Bessèges , Saint-Ambroix , Gagnières , Les Vans , Mende . The Cévennes mountains run from southwest ( Grandes causses (Causses de Blandas and Larzac) to northeast (Monts du Vivarais ), with

1704-726: The Moor Al-Samh conquered Septimania as part of the Umayyad invasion of Gaul and the Franks struggled to take it back over the next several decades, but the southern slopes of the Cévennes were permanently reconquered by 752. King Pepin the Short reconquered the whole of Septimania in 759. In the High Middle Ages , the region saw the flourishing of Romanesque architecture and monastic implantation, like Mazan Abbey . It

1775-468: The UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages , four of the six major dialects of Occitan (Provençal, Auvergnat , Limousin and Languedocien) are considered severely endangered , whereas the remaining two ( Gascon and Vivaro-Alpine ) are considered definitely endangered . The name Occitan comes from the term lenga d'òc ("language of òc "), òc being the Occitan word for yes. While

1846-582: The Val d'Aran cited c.  1000 ), but a receding Basque language (Basque banned in the marketplace of Huesca, 1349). While the language was chosen as a medium of prestige in records and official statements along with Latin in the early 13th century, Occitan faced competition from the rising local Romance vernacular, the Navarro-Aragonese , both orally and in writing, especially after Aragon's territorial conquests south to Zaragoza , Huesca and Tudela between 1118 and 1134. It resulted that

1917-681: The Cévennes but little trace has been found of humans from the Paleolithic era except in the southern portion around Ganges and Saint-Hippolyte-du-Fort which contains a large quantity of caves rich with archeological evidence such as "La Roque Aynier" (Ganges), and "Baume Dolente" ( Vebron ) which suggest the presence of Magdalenian peoples (17,000–12,000 BCE). By the Neolithic epoch, which lasted from about 12,000 BCE to around 2,300 BCE in France ( Bronze Age in France  [ fr ] ), transhumance and hunting were prevalent throughout

1988-548: The Cévennes developed a wide diversity of pastoral systems, including transhumance . The irrigation and road networks put in place in the early Middle Ages for these pastoral systems are still in use today. The name Cévennes comes from the Gaulish Cebenna . As of 1999, there were 165,707 inhabitants in the region, with 20,847 living inside the UNESCO protected zone. Inhabitants of the region are known as Cévenols, from

2059-461: The Cévennes largely remained in place, protected from attack by the hilly terrain. This area became a refuge from persecution for other Huguenots during the time. In 1702, this Huguenot population, dubbed the Camisards , rose up against the monarchy to protect their religious freedom. The two sides agreed to peace in 1715, which enabled the local Protestant Huguenot population to continue living in

2130-640: The Cévennes, they took up arms to fight for their religious freedom. As many as 3,000 Protestants fought against 30,000 royal troops from 1702 till 1704. Sporadic fighting continued until 1715. The Edict of Versailles in 1787, and the French Revolution and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in 1789, finally brought a political solution to the struggles and gave non-Catholics

2201-907: The Cévennes. Their descendants have continued to live there to the present day. During World War II , a network of families in the Cévennes sheltered a number of Jews from capture by the Nazis. These efforts, organized by local Protestant pastors, ultimately protected hundreds from capture and likely death. 3-hour TGV from Paris , 1h30 flight from London (Luton) to Nîmes (Garons) , the closest international airport and 3h30 drive from Barcelona . , by Sabine Baring-Gould Occitan language Italy Occitan ( English: / ˈ ɒ k s ɪ t ən , - t æ n , - t ɑː n / ; Occitan pronunciation: [utsiˈta, uksiˈta] ), also known as lenga d'òc ( Occitan: [ˈleŋɡɒ ˈðɔ(k)] ; French : langue d'oc ) by its native speakers, sometimes also referred to as Provençal ,

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2272-613: The Judeo-Occitan dialects, Judeo-Niçard was spoken by the community of Jews living in Nice , who were descendants of Jewish immigrants from Provence, Piedmont, and other Mediterranean communities. Its existence is attested from a few documents from the 19th century. It contained significant influence in both vocabulary and grammar from Hebrew. All three of these dialects have some influence in Southern Jewish French,

2343-735: The adjective Cévenol (fem. Cévenole). The mountain range also gives its name to a meteorological effect when cold air from the Atlantic coast meets warm air of southern winds from the Mediterranean and causes heavy autumnal downpours, often leading to floods. These are called épisodes cévenols . The origin of the name Cévennes is Celtic , coming from the Gaulish Cebenna , which was Latinized by Julius Caesar as Cevenna . The Cévennes are named Cemmenon ( Κέμμενων ) in Strabo's Geographica . The word in Gaulish probably meant ridgeline and

2414-452: The cities in southern France is unlikely to hear a single Occitan word spoken on the street (or, for that matter, in a home), and is likely to only find the occasional vestige, such as street signs (and, of those, most will have French equivalents more prominently displayed), to remind them of the traditional language of the area. Occitan speakers, as a result of generations of systematic suppression and humiliation (see Vergonha ), seldom use

2485-461: The cover rocks remained mostly horizontal. Some have been folded through later faulting at the time of the opening of the western Mediterranean in Tertiary times. The principal rivers of the region have cut deeply into the limestone forming deep gorges: Gorges du Tarn , Gorges de la Jonte , Lot , Gorges de l'Ardèche , Cèze etc. Transhumance is most likely the beginning of human activity in

2556-490: The early 12th century to the coastal fringe extending from San Sebastian to the river Bidasoa , where they settled down. The language variant they used was different from the ones in Navarre, i.e. a Béarnese dialect of Gascon. Gascon remained in use in this area far longer than in Navarre and Aragon, until the 19th century, thanks mainly to the fact that Donostia and Pasaia maintained close ties with Bayonne . Though it

2627-921: The end of the 11th century, the Franks , as they were called at the time, started to penetrate the Iberian Peninsula through the Ways of St. James via Somport and Roncesvalles , settling in various locations in the Kingdoms of Navarre and Aragon enticed by the privileges granted them by the Navarrese kings . They settled in large groups, forming ethnic boroughs where Occitan was used for everyday life, in Pamplona , Sangüesa , and Estella-Lizarra , among others. These boroughs in Navarre may have been close-knit communities that tended not to assimilate with

2698-543: The entire Cévennes with developments such as pottery moving from south to north in the region. Sheep were common in Mediterranean France before 7000 BCE and numerous prehistoric pots and tools have been recovered dating from as early as 4000 BCE. Around this time many Megalithic constructions such as stone circles , dolmen , and menhirs appeared in the area, with the second largest megalithic site in Europe,

2769-534: The geographical territory in which Occitan is spoken is surrounded by regions in which other Romance languages are used, external influences may have influenced its origin and development. Many factors favored its development as its own language. Catalan in Spain's northern and central Mediterranean coastal regions and the Balearic Islands is closely related to Occitan, sharing many linguistic features and

2840-580: The highest peak in the area, reaching 1,699 metres. The Cévennes country is rich in history, with a strong cultural identity, being at the heart of Camisard revolt, which followed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (the Edict of Fontainebleau ), after which Protestants were actively persecuted. Numerous testimonies of Camisard war in the Cévennes abund in towns and villages of the Cévennes National Park. A permanent exhibition devoted to

2911-714: The highest point being the Mont Lozère (1699m). The Mont Aigoual (1567m) is on the border of two departments. The Loire and Allier flowing towards the Atlantic Ocean, as well as the Ardèche and tributary Chassezac , Cèze , the different rivers Gardons to the Rhône , Vidourle , Hérault and Dourbie that flow to the Mediterranean Sea , have their headwaters in the Cévennes. Cévennes National Park

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2982-476: The language at the beginning of the 13th century by Catalan troubadour Raimon Vidal de Besalú(n) in his Razós de trobar : La parladura Francesca val mais et [es] plus avinenz a far romanz e pasturellas; mas cella de Lemozin val mais per far vers et cansons et serventés; et per totas las terras de nostre lengage son de major autoritat li cantar de la lenga Lemosina que de negun'autra parladura, per qu'ieu vos en parlarai primeramen. The French language

3053-460: The language in the presence of strangers, whether they are from abroad or from outside Occitania (in this case, often merely and abusively referred to as Parisiens or Nordistes , which means northerners ). Occitan is still spoken by many elderly people in rural areas, but they generally switch to French when dealing with outsiders. Occitan's decline is somewhat less pronounced in Béarn because of

3124-480: The language. Following the pattern of language shift , most of this remainder is to be found among the eldest populations. Occitan activists (called Occitanists ) have attempted, in particular with the advent of Occitan-language preschools (the Calandretas ), to reintroduce the language to the young. Nonetheless, the number of proficient speakers of Occitan is thought to be dropping precipitously. A tourist in

3195-461: The larger collection of dialects grouped under the name langues d'oïl ) should be used for all French administration. Occitan's greatest decline occurred during the French Revolution , in which diversity of language was considered a threat. In 1903, the four Gospels ( "Lis Evangèli" , i.e. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) were translated into Provençal as spoken in Cannes and Grasse. The translation

3266-515: The last speakers being elderly Jews in Bayonne . About 850 unique words and a few morphological and grammatical aspects of the dialect were transmitted to Southern Jewish French. Judeo-Provençal was a dialect of Occitan spoken by Jews in Provence . The dialect declined in usage after Jews were expelled from the area in 1498, and was probably extinct by the 20th century. The least attested of

3337-772: The latter term for the language as a whole. Many non-specialists, however, continue to refer to the language as Provençal . One of the oldest written fragments of the language found dates back to 960, shown here in italics mixed with non-italicized Latin: De ista hora in antea non decebrà Ermengaus filius Eldiarda Froterio episcopo filio Girberga ne Raimundo filio Bernardo vicecomite de castello de Cornone ... no·l li tolrà ni no·l li devedarà ni no l'en decebrà  ... nec societatem non aurà , si per castellum recuperare non o fa , et si recuperare potuerit in potestate Froterio et Raimundo lo tornarà , per ipsas horas quæ Froterius et Raimundus l'en comonrà . Carolingian litanies ( c.  780 ), though

3408-664: The leader sang in Latin , were answered to in Old Occitan by the people ( Ora pro nos ; Tu lo juva ). Other famous pieces include the Boecis , a 258-line-long poem written entirely in the Limousin dialect of Occitan between the year 1000 and 1030 and inspired by Boethius 's The Consolation of Philosophy ; the Waldensian La nobla leyczon (dated 1100), Cançó de Santa Fe ( c.  1054 –1076),

3479-498: The mediterranean littoral ecologies. The Cévennes form the south eastern fragment of the Massif Central , separated from the related Montagne Noire by the limestone Causses . The basement rocks of granites and schists were uplifted by the Variscan orogeny forming a discontinuity , with the subsequent erosion infilling the lower voids for much of Permian and Triassic period (280–195 Ma), while changing sea levels added

3550-415: The modern Occitan-speaking area. After Frédéric Mistral 's Félibrige movement in the 19th century, Provençal achieved the greatest literary recognition and so became the most popular term for Occitan. According to Joseph Anglade , a philologist and specialist of medieval literature who helped impose the then archaic term Occitan as the standard name, the word Lemosin was first used to designate

3621-485: The name that predate the French Language itself, preclude this possibility. Another false etymology suggests that the name comes from the Occitan word ceba (also written cebo ) which means "onion", which is supposed to reference the layered structure of slate which makes up the mountains. But this is not possible as the Occitan ceba derives from Latin cepa which does not phonetically fit

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3692-422: The negative sense: for example, "Vous n'avez pas de frères?" "Si, j'en ai sept." ("You have no brothers?" "But yes, I have seven."). The name "Occitan" was attested around 1300 as occitanus , a crossing of oc and aquitanus ( Aquitanian ). For many centuries, the Occitan dialects (together with Catalan ) were referred to as Limousin or Provençal , after the names of two regions lying within

3763-611: The northeast. The Volcae Arecomici voluntarily surrendered their territory to the Romans, and the Arverni gave up much territory in a treaty that nevertheless preserved their independence. Under Roman control, Le Vigan was part of the Roman "Provincia," (hence Provence ) called Gallia Narbonensis . Julius Caesar crossed the Cévennes mountains in the winter of 52 BCE, having his soldiers clear paths in up to six feet of snow, to attack

3834-488: The officially preferred language for use in the Val d'Aran. Across history, the terms Limousin ( Lemosin ), Languedocien ( Lengadocian ), Gascon , in addition to Provençal ( Provençal , Provençau or Prouvençau ) later have been used as synonyms for the whole of Occitan; nowadays, the term "Provençal" is understood mainly as the Occitan dialect spoken in Provence , in southeast France. Unlike other Romance languages such as French or Spanish , Occitan does not have

3905-424: The other. Nonetheless, specialists commonly divide Occitan into six main dialects: The northern and easternmost dialects have more morphological and phonetic features in common with the Gallo-Italic and Oïl languages (e.g. nasal vowels ; loss of final consonants; initial cha/ja- instead of ca/ga- ; uvular ⟨r⟩ ; the front-rounded sound /ø/ instead of a diphthong, /w/ instead of /l/ before

3976-447: The power of the Catholic Church in France. The Edict of Fontainebleau , on October 1685, revoked the Edict of Nantes , and forbade Protestant worship services. It called for the destruction of temples, exiling pastors, and forced Catholic instruction on the children. The borders were closed in response to the exodus of Huguenots from the area and the resulting economic losses. The Huguenots who stayed resisted and, known as Camisards in

4047-431: The predominantly Basque -speaking general population. Their language became the status language chosen by the Navarrese kings, nobility, and upper classes for official and trade purposes in the period stretching from the early 13th century to the late 14th century. Written administrative records were in a koiné based on the Languedocien dialect from Toulouse with fairly archaic linguistic features. Evidence survives of

4118-555: The province's history (a late addition to the Kingdom of France), though even there the language is little spoken outside the homes of the rural elderly. The village of Artix is notable for having elected to post street signs in the local language. The area where Occitan was historically dominant has approximately 16 million inhabitants. Recent research has shown it may be spoken as a first language by approximately 789,000 people in France , Italy , Spain and Monaco . In Monaco, Occitan coexists with Monégasque Ligurian , which

4189-404: The references to the region in Latin and Greek Literature. Additionally, the suffix -enna , originally Celtic , was brought over into Latin, and was never used for words of Latin origin. In the larger sense, the Cévennes include nine départements : le Tarn , l' Aude , l' Hérault , l' Aveyron , le Gard , la Lozère , l' Ardèche , le Rhône and la Loire . More strictly the Cévennes encompasses

4260-418: The region are protected within the Cévennes National Park , the Cévennes Biosphere Reserve (UNESCO) , as well as a UNESCO World Heritage Site : Causses and the Cévennes, Mediterranean agro-pastoral Cultural Landscape . The area has been inhabited since 400,000 BCE and has numerous megaliths which were erected beginning around 2500 BCE. As an agriculturally-rich area, but not a suitable location for cities,

4331-466: The region of Provence , historically was used for Occitan as a whole, for "in the eleventh, the twelfth, and sometimes also the thirteenth centuries, one would understand under the name of Provence the whole territory of the old Provincia romana Gallia Narbonensis and even Aquitaine ". The term first came into fashion in Italy . Currently, linguists use the terms Provençal and Limousin strictly to refer to specific varieties within Occitan, using

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4402-426: The right to practice their religion openly. In the 21st century, the region still has a large community of French Protestants . They identify as Huguenots , descendants of peoples who have inhabited the mountains since before the 16th century. During the reign of Louis XIV , much of the Huguenot population fled France, particularly following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. The Protestant community in

4473-417: The stone rows of Bondons  [ fr ] , being created around 3,000–2,500 BCE, and important sites such as the stone circles around Blandas in the south appearing between 3,500–2,500 BCE. The Celts arrived in the area sometime in the Iron Age between 800–400 BCE, and most of what is known about their presence in the area is from Latin historians. In the 3rd century BCE, the Arverne Confederation

4544-525: The term would have been in use orally for some time after the decline of Latin, as far as historical records show, the Italian medieval poet Dante was the first to have recorded the term lingua d'oc in writing. In his De vulgari eloquentia , he wrote in Latin, "nam alii oc, alii si, alii vero dicunt oil" ("for some say òc , others sì , yet others say oïl "), thereby highlighting three major Romance literary languages that were well known in Italy, based on each language's word for "yes",

4615-406: Was created in the region in 1970 and the Parc Naturel Régional des Monts d'Ardèche also preserves some of the natural areas. Two canyons are near the region: the Gorges de la Jonte (the Jonte gorge ) and the Gorges du Tarn (the Tarn gorge). This is a socio-economic marginal region, while bio-geographically, there is altitudinal stratification and a gradient between the mountainous centre and

4686-444: Was done], etc.", such as Spanish sí , Eastern Lombard sé , Italian sì , or Portuguese sim . In modern Catalan, as in modern Spanish, sí is usually used as a response, although the language retains the word oi , akin to òc , which is sometimes used at the end of yes–no questions and also in higher register as a positive response. French uses si to answer "yes" in response to questions that are asked in

4757-404: Was during this time that large-scale clearings took place under the lead of abbots and monks, allowing more space to be cultivated by the local people. The northern part of the region suffered greatly from the Hundred Years War . The English and their mercenaries occupied the Gevaudan and raided the Velay . In 1380 Bertrand Duguesclin died of illness while besieging Chateauneuf-de-Randon ,

4828-401: Was formed of several tribes who used the Cévennes as a defensive feature to prevent the Romans from taking their territories. By the time the Romans successfully conquered the area in 121 BC, several tribes of celtic Gauls were living around the Cévennes: the Ruteni in the west, the Gabali in the north, the Volcae Arecomici in the south, the Helvii in the southeast and the Vellavi in

4899-425: Was given the official Roman Catholic Imprimatur by vicar general A. Estellon. The literary renaissance of the late 19th century (in which the 1904 Nobel Prize in Literature winner, Frédéric Mistral, among others, was involved) was attenuated by World War I , when (in addition to the disruption caused by any major war) many Occitan speakers spent extended periods of time alongside French-speaking comrades. Because

4970-543: Was still an everyday language for most of the rural population of southern France well into the 20th century, it is now spoken by about 100,000 people in France according to 2012 estimates. There is a movement in regions of France where Occitan was widely spoken to introduce educational programs to encourage young people in these regions to learn the language. According to the 1999 census, there were 610,000 native speakers (almost all of whom were also native French speakers) and perhaps another million people with some exposure to

5041-411: Was the maternal language of the English queen Eleanor of Aquitaine and kings Richard I (who wrote troubadour poetry) and John . With the gradual imposition of French royal power over its territory, Occitan declined in status from the 14th century on. The Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts (1539) decreed that the langue d'oïl (French – though at the time referring to the Francien language and not

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