SOUTH TABLE
IN THE SOUTH, THE PYRENEES: ARE THEY BORDER OR TERRITORY ?
Seen from Madrid or Paris, the Pyrenees are reduced to a line of high peaks, a natural barrier: the obvious border between the two countries.
Seen from here, however, the mountains are a protective territory, a link between the two sides of Catalonia, and one of the foundations of its identity.
A deep bond exists with the other side of the Pyrenees; it has always been maintained despite a complex history: before becoming part of France, the territory was at one time under the rule of Toulouse, but also of Narbonne, then Barcelona, Toledo and even Córdoba, for a few years…
Relief, soils, microclimate, minerals… the Pyrenees have also shaped the physical characteristics of the entire region. The history of the territory, its borders, its wealth, and even its name: here, everything is written in the landscape.
Immerse yourself in this multifaceted history !
PHYSICAL HISTORY : LANDSCAPES
Mountains and seas have a history too !
Forty million years ago, the collision of Europe with the Iberian Plate created a high, narrow mountain range: the Pyrenees.
The young mountains were then about a third higher than they are today: the Canigó may once have stood at around 4,000 metres…
Some twenty million years later, the Gulf of Lion opened up, and the Mediterranean began to wash the region’s coasts. Later, it advanced inland and came to cover the Roussillon plain.
Some twenty million years later, the Gulf of Lion opened up, and the Mediterranean began to wash the region’s coasts. Later, it advanced inland and came to cover the Roussillon plain.
Two million years ago, the climate became unstable.
The Earth cooled, and ice caps formed.
Since then, ice ages have followed one another at a ‘rapid’ pace, at least by geological standards: every 100,000 years on average.
During cold periods, glaciers carved out the high-altitude valleys.
Along the coast, sea levels dropped by several tens of metres and sometimes receded by several tens of kilometres: the Roussillon doubled in size!
The slope became steeper, rivers flowed faster, and erosion increased.
During warm periods, the opposite occurs: sea levels rise and the Roussillon plain shrinks, taking on a form similar to what it is today. Valley erosion slows down.
Little by little, the landscape we see today emerges: mountainous terrain, a fertile plain and the Mediterranean coastline.
It is against this backdrop that human history will unfold…
HUMAN HISTORY: THE TERRITORIES
(5th – 10th CENTURY)
AT THE END OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, THE SHIFTING CAPITALS
The roots of the trans-Pyrenean connection are ancient. They can be traced back at least to the end of the Roman Empire.
In 410, after sacking Rome, the Visigoths were sent by the Emperor to pacify the provinces of southern Gaul and Spain.
Their king settled in Toulouse, from where he administered, amongst other areas, the territory of what would become the Pyrénées-Orientales.
A few decades later, another Germanic people, the Franks, drove the Visigoths out of Toulouse. The capital was established in Narbonne after 508, then in Barcelona from 531 onwards.
The Visigoths resisted the Franks, but at the start of the 8th century, they fell within a few years to the Arab invasion. After 719, their former territories north of the Pyrenees formed the fifth province of Al-Andalus.
Its capital was Narbonne.
AFTER CHARLEMAGNE, CATALONIA
The Franks under Pepin the Short and then Charlemagne drove out the Arabs at the end of the 8th century and took their place.
Following the conquest of Barcelona, a new hierarchy was established by the Franks: from then on, counts administered the Spanish March, a collection of some twenty territories spread across both sides of the Pyrenees.
In theory, the local lords were accountable to the Franks; in reality, they soon displayed a strong spirit of independence.
Grouped around the county of Barcelona, the counties of the Spanish March formed the core of what would become Catalonia, which was eventually incorporated into the Spanish Crown at the end of the Middle Ages.
It was within this context that the Viscounty of Castelnou was established at the end of the 10th century.
CASTELNOU AND THE ASPRES
The Count of Cerdanya and Besalú, Oliba Cabreta, began building a new castle (Castell nou) in 988 to establish the seat of a new viscounty, formed from the territories north of Besalú.
It would take the name of the Viscounty of Vallespir (Vallis Asperi, Valley of the Aspres), or of Castelnou.
His nephew, Sentill de Camélas, would become the first lord of Castelnou.
EAST TABLE
You are at the summit of a fortress situated on the first hills of the Pyrenean foothills.
Backed by a rocky scrubland, it overlooks the Roussillon plain where vineyards and cypress trees create typical Mediterranean landscapes.
The sea is nearby: you can see it to the north-east, some thirty kilometres away.
Here too, its role is significant: all the surrounding landscapes, carefully cultivated, have been largely shaped by humans, but they also owe much to the sea.
The Mediterranean enabled trade and exchange to develop very early on: Greek and then Roman travellers have been landing here for at least 2,600 years.
They brought vines, olive trees, cypresses… and found in the Roussillon plain conditions favourable to their cultivation.
Yet these fertile soils are another gift from the Mediterranean, though one dating from a
slightly earlier era: the Pliocene, 2 million years ago…
MEDITERRANEAN TRADE AND CIVILISATION: FIRST VINEYARDS, FIRST TOWNS
The Greeks offered two essential commodities: olive oil and, above all, wine!
Success was guaranteed, for as long as the monopoly lasted. But within a few centuries, the Greeks and then the Romans brought in and established vineyards; the landscape was transformed…
These traders were interested in metals: copper, silver, gold… sourced from the Pyrenean mines or the Corbières.
The three major trading posts in the region were then Agde (Hérault), Empuries (Catalonia, province of Girona) and, between the two, Pyréné or Pyrène, which was probably situated on the site of present-day Collioure.
COLLAPSE, GLACIATIONS: THE COMING AND GOING OF THE SEA
Here, both factors combine: just before the glaciations, in the Pliocene (-2 Ma), the sea level was generally quite high.
Added to this was a local effect: when the Gulf of Lion opened up a few million years earlier, the region subsided between the Pyrenees and the Corbières.
The sea rushed into this hollow and penetrated inland for nearly 30 km.
At the time, Perpignan was under water, and the beach was at Thuir !
During the ice ages, on the other hand, sea levels sometimes dropped by more than 100 m compared to today’s levels.
The shoreline then retreated by several kilometres, and the valleys deepened…
These fluctuations, over the past 2 million years, have helped shape the department’s terrain and soils.
The Aspres and the natural regions of the Pyrénées-Orientales
The Aspres consist of rocky, wooded hills, with significant variations in altitude, ranging from 150 m to over 1,300 m.
This impressive landscape explains the name of the area: ‘aspre’, meaning ‘harsh’ or ‘rugged’ in Catalan, refers to difficult, rugged terrain, but also to arid land.
On a clear day, you can see Agde and Sète – binoculars recommended!
Note that in the foreground lies the Leucate coastal strip, which marks the boundary between the Étang de Salses and the Mediterranean.
TABLE NORD
To the north of Castelnou, you can see the fertile plain of Roussillon, and in the distance the rocky ridge of the Corbières
The territories that now make up the department were long disputed between Spain and France: for four centuries, the border ran along this ridge of the Corbières.
The castles of Peyrepertuse and Quéribus bear witness to this…
At the end of the 10th century, the Count of Cerdagne and Besalú, Oliba Cabreta, established the new viscounty of Vallespir.
The political situation was complicated, with numerous, shifting, and sometimes contradictory alliances.
The new viscounts’ first priority was to fortify their castle and develop a complex network of signal towers to monitor the territory.
The kings of France continued to claim rights, inherited from Charlemagne, over the territories of the Spanish March.
The kings of Aragon, for their part, laid claim to territories in Languedoc.
The Viscounts of Castelnou remained vassals of Besalú: so, when Besalú came under the control of the Count of Barcelona and then the King of Aragon, Vallespir fell under this new authority and shifted to the Spanish side.
The territories disputed here by the kings of France and Aragon were Roussillon, Conflent and Cerdagne.
In 1258, the Treaty of Corbeil established the border south of the Corbières.
It was difficult for an army to cross. The few possible crossings were fortified and guarded (fortresses of Peyrepertuse, Quéribus, Fenouillet…)
The coast offered an easier route, but one that narrowed at a specific point, near the Salses/Leucate lagoon.
This bottleneck was a strategic chokepoint: the two kingdoms built rival fortresses there, at Leucate for France and at Salses-le-Château for Spain.
Finally, the Treaty of the Pyrenees of 1659 confirmed French ownership of a large part of the three former counties and shifted the border to the Pyrenean ridge: the province of Roussillon was born.
This western tip of the Roussillon plain had long been French territory, and the language spoken there was Occitan rather than Catalan: the newly formed department is trilingual…