Agenais
The Agenais or Agenois is a historic province of France . It belongs to the Occitan language area and was surrounded almost on all sides by the Duchy of Aquitaine ; only the south-east borders on the county of Toulouse and the vice-county of Lomagne , which was part of Gascon . The Agenais, together with the Arrondissement Nérac, roughly corresponds to the boundaries of today's Lot-et-Garonne . The total number of inhabitants is approx. 350,000 with a total area of approx. 5,600 km²; Without the Arrondissement Nérac and smaller neighboring areas, there are approx. 300,000 inhabitants and an area of approx. 3500 km².
geography
landscape
The hilly landscape of the Agenais, characterized by fields, forests and vineyards, is mostly at heights between approx. 25 to 200 m above sea level. d. M .; Elevations over 200 m are rare.
Cities
The largest cities in the Agenais are Agen (approx. 36,000 or almost 100,000 inhabitants in the greater area), Villeneuve-sur-Lot (approx. 24,000), Marmande (approx. 18,000), Tonneins (approx. 9,000), Fumel (approx. 5,000 ), Aiguillon (approx. 4,000), Miramont (approx. 3,500) and Sainte-Bazeille (approx. 3,300).
Rivers
Apart from the Garonne , which forms the southwestern border of the Agenais, and the Lot , which flows into the Garonne at Aiguillon, there are no major rivers. Perhaps worth mentioning is the much smaller gupie that flows into the Garonne at Sainte-Bazeille .
climate
The climate of the Agenais, which is largely influenced by the Atlantic , is mild; Night frosts or daytime temperatures of over 35 ° C are extremely rare.
history
In ancient Gaul , the area of Agenais was the home of the Nitiobrogen with Aginnum , today's Agen , as the capital. In the 4th century it formed the Civitas Agennensium as part of the Roman province of Aquitania secunda . In the time of the Merovingians and Carolingians , the Agenais belonged to Aquitaine , and subsequently became a hereditary county as part of Gascon .
In 1038 the county was acquired by the Dukes of Aquitaine and Counts of Poitou . The marriage of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Heinrich Plantagenet brought the Agenais under English rule in 1152. When their son Richard the Lionhearted his sister Johanna with Raimund VI in 1196 . , Count of Toulouse , married, the agenais was part of the bride's dowry . With the remaining areas of the county of Toulouse, Agenais came to the French crown in 1271.
As early as 1279, when the French king had to recognize the older rights of the English king Edward I , the Agenais was returned to the English crown. But there was no real lasting peace between the two powers: In the years 1323 to 1325 there was the so-called War of Saint-Sardos , which was a prelude to the Hundred Years War . During the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453) the area changed hands several times, and only the retreat of the English (1453) brought it peacefully to the French.
From now on, Agenais was just an administrative term. In the years 1572 to 1615, the county of Apanage belonged to Marguerite de Valois , the wife of King Henry IV. At the end of the Ancien Régime , it was part of the Guyenne province and became part of the newly created Lot- department during the French Revolution (1789–1799). et-Garonne , of which it is now the main component.
The title of Comte d'Agenais , which had fallen out of use under the English kings in the Middle Ages, was revived by the French kings in the 17th century. It was run by the Le Plessis-Richelieu family .
economy
Traditionally, Agenais, which today is largely characterized by wheat fields etc., is a wine-growing region, which, however, has so far only produced mediocre to good country wines ( Vins de Pays de l'Agenais ), which were previously exported via the Garonne and Bordeaux to England and Northern Europe. The Côtes de Duras and Côtes du Marmandais vineyards are closer to the Saint-Émilion wine-growing region and are considered to be significantly more substantial. The Garonne Lateral Canal , put into operation in 1856, ensures the connection of the Agenais to the Atlantic and the Mediterranean; This made shipping and trade easier. Today the A62 autoroute , which runs through the Garonne Valley, plays a much more important role. Tourism is only of minor importance economically.
art
The cultural center of the Agenais is the city of Agen with the cathedral Saint-Caprais , the Jacobin church Notre-Dame , the church Saint-Hilaire as well as numerous noble palaces (hôtels) , but also the city Marmande offers numerous historical sights. There are numerous historic churches and other buildings in the rural regions, ranging from medieval Romanesque and Gothic to Baroque and Classicism . The most important museum is the Musée des Beaux Arts in Agen, which shows tapestries and paintings from the 16th to the early 20th century.
literature
Individual evidence
- ↑ Agenois - map with altitude information
- ↑ Agen - climate diagrams
- ↑ Xavier De Planhol, Paul Claval: An Historical Geography of France . In: Paul Claval (Ed.): Cambridge Studies in Historical Geography Series . tape 21 . Cambridge University Press, 1994, ISBN 0-521-32208-1 , pp. 179 (English, online ).
- ↑ Peter Landau, Uta-Renate Blumenthal, Anders Winroth (ed.): Canon Law, Religion, and Politics: "Liber Amicorum" Robert Somerville . Catholic University of America Press, 2012, ISBN 978-0-8132-1975-2 , pp. 74 (Latin, online [accessed November 23, 2012]).
- ↑ a b L'histoire d'Agen. Le Moyen Age. (No longer available online.) Office de Tourisme d'Agen, archived from the original on February 1, 2012 ; Retrieved November 23, 2012 (French). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Benoît Cursente: Guyenne . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 4, Artemis & Winkler, Munich / Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-7608-8904-2 , Sp. 1807-1809.
- ↑ Michel Moisan: L'exil auvergnat de Marguerite de Valois . Éditions Creer, 1999, ISBN 2-909797-42-2 , pp. 31 (French, online ).
- ↑ La Guyenne (anct Guienne). une province avortée. In: valleedudropt.com. Retrieved November 23, 2012 (French).
- ↑ Claire Tylor: Heresy In Medieval France: Dualism In Aquitaine And The Agenais 1000-1249 . In: Royal Historical Society (ed.): Royal Historical Society Studies . tape 46 . Boydell & Brewer, 2005, ISBN 0-86193-276-5 , pp. 47 (English, online ).
- ^ Jean Baptiste Pierre Jullien de Courcelles: Histoire généalogique et héraldique des pairs de France . des grands dignitaires de la couronne, des principales familles nobles du royaume, et des maisons princières de l'Europe, précédée de la généalogie de la maison de France. tape 8 , 1827, pp. 360 ff . (French, online ).
