Natural Area of France

A natural area of France , or traditional Country (coming from the Latin word Pagus ), is an area of wide often limited (a few tens of kilometers) with homogeneous physical characters (Géomorphologie, Géologie, Climat, grounds, water resources…) associated with an also homogeneous human occupation (perception and management of specific Soil S, development of Landscape S and an cultural identity clean).

These countries were at the same time recognized and invented by the geographers, the local scholars and the former rural populations, in particular since the 16th century. They can also take root in the long story of a feudal stronghold.

The historical heritage

Many natural areas of France could correspond to a political limit with the Moyen-âge, inherited the Gallo-Roman pagi (and sometimes, through them, the territory of a Gallic people or with the radiation of a city on its back country. In the long term the natural areas, confused with the political power which managed them, could give their name to entities much vaster. This implies sometimes major confusions: same name often indicating very different spaces and sometimes without relationship with the " pays" who bears this name (the natural area, its zone of more or less perennial historical influence, its possible administrative misadventures). The examples are numerous:
  • the Pays of France extended its name to the France
  • the Artois (country of Arras) and the Comté of Artois
  • the Hainaut (which was in the beginning limited to the valley of the Haine) indicates historical entities and an administrative province of Belgium)
etc

The contemporary reality of the traditional countries

The current administrative limits only coincide very exceptionally with a natural area. Moreover, the cultural share and the historical heritages which influence the perception of an area " naturelle" make sometimes delicate a precise definition of each country , in particular in the absence of a physical Déterminisme extremely. The perception of a space lived and shared by its inhabitants tends to be erased with the standardization of the lifestyles, the urbanization, the mechanization of agriculture, the attraction of regional metropolises. The natural areas do not remain about it less one tangible reality, sometimes dominating, through the natural resources and constraints, the soils, the landscapes, the toponyms, traditional architecture, the gastronomy, the local identities.

A revival of the concept of country/natural area

Provided with a physical and cultural identity more or less marked, the natural areas of France are a space perceived and lived by their inhabitants, but often with dubious limits and without administrative recognition. Their scale, is however often relevant and adapted to town and country planning, also, the concept of natural area and traditional country from now on is taken into account through the LOADTP (Law of Orientation of the Durable Installation of the Territory) which defines Pays (French territorial division) with specific projects. Attention however with confusions, because the countries ( Law Voynet ), while taking again an identical name sometimes, are of different nature and do not take again the same limits exactly, for example for the Pays of Bray and the Country of Bray (Loi Voynet).

List natural areas of France

How much natural areas in France?

Benedicte and Jean-Jacques Fénié count 546 of them (Pays of Auch to the Yvelines). The relatively fuzzy notion of the Country/natural Région limits the possibility of drawing up a precise list. Various entities, quite as relevant the ones as the others but with different criteria or a point of view, are likely to overlap on same geographical space.

Alsace

Aquitaine

Auvergne

Burgundy

Brittany

  • the Leon
  • the Trégor
  • the Cornwall
  • Vannetais or Broërec
  • country of Saint-Brieuc or Goëlo-Penthièvre
  • country of Saint-Malo
  • country of Fraud
  • country Of Rennes
  • Nantes country

Center

  • Beauce
  • Blaisois
  • Boischaut-North
  • Boischaut-South
  • Brenne (Blancois)
  • Champagne berrichonne
  • Champaigne tourangelle
  • Drouais
  • Forest of tourangelle Orleans
  • Gâtine de Loches
  • Gâtine
  • Country-Extremely (Sancerrois, Loire Valley)
  • Plate of Saint-Moor
  • Area of Turns (Loire Valley tourangeau, Low valley of Expensive the, Champeigne, Chinonais , Country of Amnoise, Country of Bourgeuil, Country of Langeais, Véron)
  • Richelais
  • the Sologne
  • Thymerais
  • Val of Germigny
  • Loire Valley orléanais
  • Loire Valley orléanais
  • Vendômois
  • Vaux Dormouse)
  • Varennes ligériennes
  • Véron

Champagne-Ardenne

Corsica

  • Balagne
  • Corsica Cape
  • Castagniccia
  • Cortenais
  • Two-Prevailed
  • Marana
  • Nebbio
  • Niolo
  • Flat of Aléria
  • Area of Ajaccio
  • Area of Porto-Vecchio
  • Sartenais (Alta Rocca)

Franche-Comté

  • Country of Belfort
  • Area of Besancon
  • Dolois
  • Country of Gray (Chantinois, Dampierrois)
  • Haut-Doubs (Plate of Maîche it Russey, Country of Morteau)
  • the High-Jura
  • Country of Lure
  • Country of Montbeliard
  • Small Mountain
  • Revermont
  • Country of Vesoul
  • Vineyard
  • the Vosges saônoises

Ile-de-France

Languedoc-Roussillon

The Limousin

Lorraine

  • Barrois
  • Côtes of Meuse
  • the High Vosges (Country of Saint-Dié)
  • Lunévillois
  • Moselle-Is
  • Pays of Bitche (Pays of Sarreguemines)
  • Pays of Nancy
  • Pays of Neufchâteau
  • Pays of Pont-à-Mousson ($the Hague)
  • Pays of Sarrebourg
  • Pays of Nied
  • Metz-native Pays
  • Country-High (Pays of Montmédy)
  • under-Vosgean Plaine
  • Saulnois
  • Thionvillois
  • Toul-native
  • Valley of Meuse
  • Vermois
  • Vôge
  • Warndt
  • Woëvre
  • Xaintois

The Midday-Pyrenees

Nord-Pas-de-Calais

Since work of the geologist Jules Gosselet at the 19th century, two great whole of natural areas is distinguished in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais: the “Low-Country” made up of Flat S and Hill S with the soft reliefs and the “High-Country” whose reliefs are marked better (plate X chalky, reliefs pre-inhabitant of the Ardennes and buttonhole of Bolted…). Cartographic proposals of Jules Gosselet, only the area Nervie, indicating (according to old the Civitas of the Nerviens) the area between the the Scheldt and the Avesnois was hardly re-used although it raises the geographical ambiguity of the Hainaut term.

The limit between the Top and Low-Country, taken again by the geographer Jean Summoned, is relevant as well in physical geography as human, it constitutes the septentrional limit of the Paris basin.

Normandy

Country of the Loire

  • the mancelles Alps
  • Baugeois
  • Bocage mayennais
  • Vendean Bocage (Pays of Brem, High-Scrap-metal)
  • Calaisien
  • Craonnais
  • Maine angevin
  • Breton Marais
  • Marais poitevin
  • Vendean Marais (Île of Yeu, Île of Noirmoutier)
  • Mauges
  • Mayenne angevine
  • Pays of Laval
  • Pays of Olonne
  • Pays manceau (Pays of Sanded)
  • Flat Vendean
  • Saosnois
  • Saumur-native
  • Segréen
  • Talmondais
  • Valley of Anjou

Picardy

Poitou-Charentes

Provence-Alp-coast of Azure

The Rhone-Alps

See too

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