Loire Valley

The Loire Valley , such as it was registered in 2000 on the Liste of the world heritage of UNESCO, indicates the part of the valley of the the Loire located between the Sully-on-Loire (in the Loiret) and the Chalonnes-on-Loire (in Maine-et-Loire). It constitutes an exceptional site for its biological diversity like for its historical and cultural richness (parks, castles and cities).

Fast overflight

This part of the river crosses two areas, the Center and the Pays of the Loire, and four departments, the Loiret, the Loir-et-Cher, the Indre-et-Loire and the Maine-et-Loire. The river, directed after the Sully-on-Loire in the west-north-west direction, curves with Orleans to move then in west-south-west direction. In the Loire Valley, the river receives many affluents, mainly south, three more important being the Expensive , the Indre and the Vienna.

Between Orleans and Angers, the valley is often bordered of small cliffs of Tuffeau and Calcaire. Many gravel or small islands and sand banks strew the course with the river, of which the depth and the width vary considerably one season with the other and from one year to another. The Crue S of the Loire generally take place in winter and, thanks to the presence of Digue S ( raised ) on most of its course, are generally without serious consequences. The valley however known in its history of the important floods, sometimes catastrophic, in all seasons. Their trace is preserved of place in place thanks to indications height and year on the dams or the buildings.

While descending the course from the river, one meets the towns of Orleans, Blois, Amboise, Tours, Saumur and Angers (a little with the variation of the river, on the Maine), but also of many boroughs and villages, like some of the Loire ch4ateau, in particular those of the Sully-on-Loire, Blois, Chaumont-sur-Loire, Amboise, Saumur, others being located at the variation of the river, often close to one of his affluents, like Chambord close to the Cosson, Chenonceau on Expensive, or Chinon in the valley of the Vienna.

History

As of the Paleolithic , the men were installed on the banks of the Loire and the many rivers of the area. Starting from 10000 until worms 4000 av. J. - C., the original populations of hunters-gatherers gradually transformed into sedentary populations completely of farmers - stockbreeders. This transformation was the consequence, at the same time of the abandonment of the nomadism by the local populations, then arrival of populations of farmers come from the the Middle East.

The communities gathered then in structured companies, to lead to the territorial organization of the Gallic people around their Cité S. To the IV E, the country of the Carnutes, with the site of the current Orléanais, was regarded as the center of the Gaulle. They is there that the annual meeting took place itself of the Druide S. Bien before the Roman conquest, the sites of all the current important cities existed already.

Except for the attempts at rising of Carnutes and Andécaves, Jules César met only little resistance in the area at the time of its conquest. The Gallic ones adopted the Roman lifestyle quickly, especially in the already existing cities (Orleans, Tours, Angers), around the forum, of the theater and the thermal baths. The Gallo-Roman period saw a significant development of the production and trade.

The Christianisme developed as from the 4th century under the impulse of the bishop S of Turns, Orleans and Angers. Martin de Tours, one of the fathers of the Church, bishop of 371 until its death in 397, was one of the most active craftsmen of the evangelization. Monastère S were founded, like those of Fleury (future Saint-Beno4it cheese) and of Marmoutier. Under the Carolingian dynasty, two close relations of Charlemagne, Alcuin and Théodulphe, created in the area of the monastic schools which had a great cultural influence. The “cruel” invasions do not épargnérent the Valley of Loire : although the Buckwheats, pushed back at the 8th century by Charles Martel, could not cross the Loire, the Viking S, as of the middle of the 9th century, went up the river with their Drakkar S and plundered the cities and the abbeys of the valley.

With the the Middle Ages, the Loire Valley was the theater of almost continual fights of at the 15th century. They related to initially the succession with the crown of England, then the fight between Capétiens and Plantagenêts for the possession of the Kingdom of France. The final chapter of these fights, the War One hundred Year old (1340 - 1453), was marked by the feats of arms of Jeanne d' Arc, which delivered in particular Orleans the May 8th 1429, release whose city commemorates each birthday since the year 1430, at the time of its johannic Fêtes.

The Renaissance saw the apogee of the role of the Loire Valley within the Kingdom of France. Of Louis XI, which made Towers its capital in 1461, until Henri IV which brought back it to Paris in 1594, the center of the capacity remained in the area. The Valois, which had discovered in Italy a new esthetics and a new art of living, did not have of cease to transpose them in the Loire Valley, while making there come from many artists and Italian craftsmen, of which most famous of them, Léonard de Vinci. Thus was born what was called later the first French Rebirth, during which were renovated the royal castles of Amboise and Blois, then built “castles of court” intended for the pleasure, most remarkable being that of Chambord.

With and centuries, the area lives to increase its role of axis of communication thanks to the creation of channels (of Briare and Orleans), which constituted one period ostentation for the Marine of the Loire. The Révolution did not involve serious disorders in the area and was overall well accepted, except notable for the rebellion of the peasants of the Mauges in the south of the Anjou.

At the 19th century, the appearance of the Railroad introduced radical changes into the landscape ligérien, while making disappear navigation on the river, as well as the activity of the wearing of the Loire.

Culture of the Loire Valley

The landscapes of the Loire Valley, characterized by the harmonious combination of water of the river and the vegetation of the forest, for a long time inspired the artists. Among their first literary representations, poetries of Charles of Orleans and works of François Rabelais are most famous.

At the time of the Rebirth, these landscapes made the object of literary, pictorial representations and flowers stand which set them up in esthetic models. Thanks to the meeting in the Loire Valley of the cultures Italian, Flemish and French, a gardened landscape model was born around the Loire. The extension of the garden and its farming techniques to the territory between river and forest found its expression strongest in Touraine. This area, very early celebrated like the “Garden of France”, was often used as model with the whole of the national territory, whose gardened aspect is regarded by much as characteristic of France.

The poets of the Rebirth, like Pierre de Ronsard or Joachim of Bellay celebrated the beauties of the landscapes, which they considered also remarkable, if not more, that those of the area of Rome, where remained Of Bellay. After the Rebirth, the landscapes ligériens continued to be celebrated by many writers, like Jean of the Fountain or the Marquise of Sévigné at the 17th century, and, at the 19th century, by Alfred de Vigny, Gustave Flaubert, Honore de Balzac, Charles Baudelaire or even Victor Hugo, of which the romantic sensitivity was harmonized with the romanticism of the landscapes of the Loire.

The pictorial representations only appeared more tardily. The Loire is indeed not let represent easily. According to Rene Bazin, this difficulty comes from too vast dimensions of its valley, and its fine light “, buckled, that no strong shade raises, any contrast”. Rather than to show it in all its width, the painters and engravers largely represented its bridges, its quays and the “faces of the Loire” of its villages and its cities. One of the most remarkable series of tables on the Loire Valley east without question that carried out by the English painter Joseph Mallord William Turner at the time of her voyage between Nantes and Orleans in 1826, which knew to invent from the original points of view and to use the transparencies of the Aquarelle to suggest the smoothness of the light.

The vine and wine

Flora and fauna

Large variety of the Biotope S of the river and its banks: sandy banks and benches, gravel small islands covered with vegetation, easily flooded wooded banks, dams of protection, terraces of the major Bed, forests, accommodate a large variety of natural habitats, from which profit a flora and a fauna rich person and abundant.

Flora

In the national natural reserve of Saint-Mesmin, located at 4 km downstream from Orleans, one listed 558 species of plants higher from including 3 protected at the national level (vulgar Pulicaire, Gagée meadows, wild Tulipe) and 5 at the regional level (watery Limoselle, yellow Pigamon, Corydale with full bulb, Laîche of the Loire, Scille of autumn). One also counts 37 species of Bryophyte S and 325 species of mushrooms. In the zones with weak current close relations of banks, one can observe various floating or immersed plants, like the watery buttercups, the Potamot S or the Jussie S, exotic plants invading. In the stagnant water zones, one finds the same type of vegetation as in the pond S, in particular the duckweeds.

After high waters of winter and spring, the low water level S of summer let appear the broad wide ones of sand and vase which colonize of the annual plants, initially tiny the shoveler ducks, the voyageuse Veronique or the Renoncule scélérate, then the Corrigiole of the banks, the Bidens or the vulgar Pulicaire.

On more raised alluvial terraces, less frequently covered by water with the river, develops a very varied vegetation which depends on the nature of the alluvia. According to the cases, one can find a vegetation close-cropped formed of small plants fatty (Sedum S), of Graminée S pionnières like the Corynéphore S, or, on the richest grounds, of the meadows dominated by the graminaceous ones like the Wild oats or the Pâturin of the meadows, and species which will follow one another in the course of the years, eleven hour old lady in spring, then Sauge of the meadows, and Campanule in summer.

If the man or the risings does not prevent them from developing, they are the trees and the shrubs which settle ensuite : Willow S shrubby in the lowest zones (Willow with three cheesecloths, Willow crimson, Willow of the basket makers), black Poplar and large willows (white Willow and fragile Willow) in the more raised zones, less subjected to the risings, then finally the forest of Ash S, Oak S and Elm S.

Fauna

In the national natural reserve of Saint-Mesmin, one listed 294 species of Vertébré S and 535 of Invertébré S. Among the vertebrate ones, one counts 29 Poisson S (Chabot, Bouvière, Atlantic Saumon, Allis shad, pretended Alose, Anguille, frank Loche, épinochette…), 4 Amphibian S (like the nimble Frog), 7 Reptile S (Lizard of the walls, Lizard of the stocks…), 226 Bird X among which 65 nicheurs (Small gravelot, Rousserolle reed warbler, Reed of the snap rings, kingfisher of Europe, Bouscarle de Cetti…), 190 of passage (Knight guignette, Reed bunting, Osprey…) and 103 wintering (like the Large cormorant), 29 species of mammals of which the beaver of Europe and 13 species of bats.

The islands and the banks sandy, low in vegetation, are the place of election of the terns (dwarf Sterne and Estorlet), of the Petit gravelot and the Chevalier guignette. As for the vegetalized islands, they are often colonized by the species Grégaire S like the Black-headed gull, the leucophée Mouette mélanocéphale or the Goéland. The island with the gulls with Bou, upstream of Orleans, in is a spectacular example.

The abundance of fish attracts some species strictly Piscivore the S, emblématique being the Osprey, which did not nest any more in continental France since the beginning of the 20th century. Starting from 1985, year when a first couple installed its nest on a woodland Pin in the forest of Orleans, the population progressed to reach 21 couples in 2004. The other important piscivorous species, the Large cormorant, attends especially the Loire in winter season. Rare species on the Loire before 1975, its population is in continuous increase since, reaching from now on several thousands of individuals.

The semi-watery mammals are also present on the Loire. Certain species were introduced by the man, like the Ragondin, originating in Muskrat or South America,, of North America. The species indigenous S are the beaver and the otter of Europe; both, rare and vulnerable, is protected by the law. The populations of otters however start to be reconstituted gradually, starting from the higher courses of the Loire and Allier.

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