AQUITAINE INFORMATION
AQUITAINE Topography
The modern region Aquitaine covers an area of 41,308 km², 7.6 percent of France's total area. It is bounded to the south by Spain, to the east by Midi-Pyrénées, to the north by Poitou-Charentes and Limousin and to the west by the Atlantic Ocean. It includes the departments of Dordogne, Gironde, Landes, Lot-et-Garonne and Pyrénées-Atlantiques.
AQUITAINE Climate
Southwestern France is favoured by a sunny climate from the early spring until late autumn. In the Pyrenees, summers are dry and not too hot. The areas of the mountains have their own micro climate, where one town can have clear sunshine, and merely 10 km away, it may be cloudy. The coastal area is often favoured by wind from the Atlantic Ocean which freshens it up a little.
The average temperature is about 10 degrees in the wintertime and 22-25 degrees in the summertime.
AQUITAINE Demographics
Population (2007): 3,123,000 (5.05% of Metropolitan France's population)
AQUITAINE Main cities
Major cities in Aquitaine include Bordeaux, Pau, Bayonne, Mont-de-Marsan, Biarritz, Bergerac and Périgueux.
AQUITAINE Wine
Bordeaux is a verry big wine region, located in the Gironde department, in South-West of France. One of the most important wine regions in Europe, the name of Bordeaux is worldly known as the largest fine wine-producing vineyard in the world. Bordeaux produces 25% of the AOC in France. It also produces all of the three main types of wine: red wines, dry white wines, and sweet white wines. See the France's Vineyards Map and also Bordeaux map, bergerac map, armagnac map and cognac map.
AQUITAINE History
There are traces of human settlement by prehistoric peoples, especially in the Perigord, but the earliest attested inhabitants in the south-west were the Aquitane, who were not proper Celtic people, but more akin to the Iberians (see Gallia Aquitania). The original Aquitania (named after the inhabitants) comprised at the time of Caesar's conquest of Gaul the area bounded by the Garonne River, the Pyrenees and the ocean. The name may stem from Latin 'aqua', maybe derived from the town "Aquae Augustae", "Aquae Tarbellicae" or just "Aquis" (Dax, Akize in modern Basque) or as a more general geographical feature.
Under Augustus' Roman rule, since 27 BC the province of Aquitane was further stretched to the north till the River Loire, so including proper Gaul tribes along with old Aquitani south of the Garonne (cf. Novempopulania and Gascony) within the same region. In 392, the Roman imperial provinces were restructured and Aquitania Prima, Aquitania Secunda and Aquitania Tertia (or Novempopulania) were established in south-western Gaul.
AQUITAINE HOLIDAY RENTALS in Region of FRANCE
MORE THAN 10.000 B&B in all France
MORE THAN 10.000 Gîtes in all France
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