Aude

Aude is a department in southern France, located in Occitania and named after the river Aude. The departmental council also calls it "Cathar Country" after a group of religious dissidents active in the 12th to 14th centuries.
Its prefecture is Carcassonne and its subprefectures are Limoux and Narbonne. As of 2019, it had a population of 374,070. Aude is a frequent feminine French given name in Francophone countries, deriving initially from Aude or Oda, a wife of Bertrand, Duke of Aquitaine, and mother of Eudo, brother of Saint Hubertus. Aude was the name of Roland's fiancée in the chansons de geste.

Geography

Location

Aude is located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Pyrenees Mountains.
It is part of the current region of Occitanie. It is surrounded by the departments of Pyrénées-Orientales, Ariège, Haute-Garonne, Tarn, and Hérault, with the Golfe du Lion on the east.

Natural regions

The countryside in this department falls into several natural regions:

1 – Lauragais
2 – Montagne Noire
3 – Cabardès
4 – Carcassonais
5 – Razès
6 – Quercorb
7 – Pays de Sault
8 – Minervois
9 – Corbières
10 – Narbonnais
Landscapes

Each natural region of the Aude has its own particular landscape. In the east, lagoons or coastal lakes separate land and sea. These were formed by accumulations of sediments carried down by the rivers Aude, Orb and Hérault. There are many such lakes of brackish water. This environment is demanding for flora and fauna, as it suffers from the rigours of sea, sun, dryness and floods. Halophile plants grow there. The area is also noted for the pink flamingo and the white stilt.
Inland to the west, shrub and scrub dominate the landscape of the drylands of the Aude and the Corbières Massif. This landscape is the result of forest clearance, maintained by the raising of livestock. The flora is varied and characterized by many species of orchids. The Sault countryside is dominated by beech groves and fir plantations up to the mountains. These forests are known for their mushrooms, and have a rich flora and fauna, including the Pyrenean lily, the euproctis moth and horsetail of the woods.
To the north and west, the Black Mountain country is made up of forests of oak and beech. The Lauragais is a wooded landscape where grain farming has shaped the hills. There are bodies of water like the Lac de la Ganguise. Finally, the high valley of the Aude, otherwise called the Razès, consists of a riparian forest made of beech, alder, poplar or ash. It includes some peatlands that are very rare in southern France.

Geology

The landscapes of Aude can be explained by its geology. In the south, there are sedimentary rocks folded during the formation of the Pyrenees. To the north and centre of Aude, the sedimentary rocks are less folded. At the extreme east, near the Mediterranean, the rocks are carved by normal collapse faults which are due to the opening of the Golfe du Lion. The limestone Massif de la Clape runs along the entire coast from Gruissan to Saint-Pierre-la-Mer, and has to be crossed to go from Narbonne to Narbonne-Plage.
In the north, the Black Mountain and Minervois consist of schist and marble, forming the southern edge of the Massif Central. These ancient rocks are over 300 million years old and were deformed by the formation of the Hercynian chain. The Montagne d'Alaric near Carcassonne is an antiform fold in the shape of a vault and made of limestone.

Climate

Aude is under the influence of a Mediterranean climate.
The autumn is characterized by violent and short storms.
The summer is often hot and dry, which is favorable to the culture of the vine and the olive-trees. Yet, the department has several contrasts in climate:
In the north, the Montagne Noire and, in the south, the Pays de Sault, have a mountainous climate with temperatures sometimes very low in winter.
In the west, the climate is under Aquitaine influence with heavier precipitation, while in the east the climate is purely Mediterranean.
In the centre, in the Limouxin, Carcassonnais and Razès areas, the climate is known as intermediary with significant exposure to winds.
The winds are often present in Aude. It is one of the windiest French departments, with 300 to 350 days of wind per year. This phenomenon is due mostly to the variations in relief north and south which create a kind of corridor.
In the north-west blows the Cers, called Tramontane in Provence, which is a ground wind. It is a dry, somewhat violent wind and cold in winter. In the south-east blows the Autan, locally called the Marin, which is hot and wet and comes from the sea.
These regular winds made it possible to install an industrial park of wind turbines, as in the area of Avignonet-Lauragais.

Hydrography

The drainage system of Aude is dominated by its river of the same name. The river rises at the Roc d'Aude and passes through the Matemale and Puyvalador dams on the Capcir plateau at 1500m, then crosses the department from south to north across Axat, Limoux, and Quillan following the upper valley of the Aude. At Carcassonne, the river changes direction toward the Mediterranean Sea to the east, where it empties near Fleury.

Principal towns

The most populous commune is Narbonne; the prefecture Carcassonne is the second-most populous. As of 2019, there are 5 communes with more than 10,000 inhabitants:

Commune	Population
Narbonne	55,516
Carcassonne	46,825
Castelnaudary	12,187
Lézignan-Corbières	11,317
Limoux	10,012

History

Prehistory

Hammers and worked tools have been found on the hill of Grazailles at Carcassonne, dating from between 690,000 and 300,000 years ago. Most interesting is the skull of Tautavel Man, discovered in 1971 by Henry de Lumley in the commune of Tautavel in the Pyrénées-Orientales department. It is the oldest-known skull in Europe. It dates from about 450,000 years BC. It is likely that Tautavel Man lived in all of this region.

Roman Era

The Romans, led by the consul-general Domitius Ahenobarbus, first occupied the oppidum of Montlaurès in 118 BC, a few kilometres to the north of Narbonne. This became the provincial capital and a very active mercantile port. The position was strategically important since it stood at the crossroads of two Roman roads, the Via Aquitania and the Via Domitia, as well as by the sea near the mouth of the river Aude. Carcassonne became Latin in 30 BC with the creation of numerous grain farms. For almost two centuries, Aude enjoyed peace and strong economic growth.

Barbarian invasions

The Visigoths invaded the area in 435 AD at a time when Flavius Aetius, the Roman senator, was busy suppressing the Bagaudes, who were brigands or lawless types in central and northern Gaul. Roman authority was restored until 462. In 507, the victory of Clovis I at the battle of Vouillé permitted him to conquer Toulouse and Aquitaine. However, he could not recover the Aude territory, which, thanks to the help of the King of the Ostrogoths, remained in the hands of the Visigoths. His troops defeated Clovis's son in 508. The region was part of Septimania, so called because it was composed of seven bishoprics that the Visigoth kings had established there: Elne, Agde, Narbonne, Lodève, Béziers, Maguelonne, and Nîmes. Septimania covered the Aude but also the whole region of Languedoc-Roussillon.

Middle Ages

In 817, Louis le Débonnaire detached Carcassès and Razès from Septimania to reunite them with the marquisate of Toulouse and the kingdom of Aquitaine. The first Count of Carcassonne was Oliba from the family of the Counts of Barcelona. He established himself in 819. Razès was another county that was formed by an archbishop of Narbonne who had been chased from his town by the Saracens. He had transferred his episcopal seat to Razès and had procured the honours of the feudal title for the area. Narbonne formed a third county. Thus, in the ninth century, the département of Aude consisted of three counties: Carcassonne, Razès and Narbonne. In 880, the County of Razès was united by marriage to that of Carcassonne, never to be separated.

Catharism in Aude

In the 13th century, the region saw the development of Catharism: a dualistic Christian sect with similarities to Gnosticism. This religion was very quickly judged as heretical by the Catholic Church. Faced with its growing strength in the counties of Carcassonne and Toulouse, Pope Innocent III in 1209 declared a crusade against the Albigensians. The barons of the north united to form an army under the command of Simon de Montfort. Whereas the count of Toulouse Raymond VI received absolution, the Count of Carcassonne confronted the army alone. The city of Carcassonne became the refuge of numerous Cathars.

The Protestant crisis and economic expansion of the department

In 1561, religious troubles again arose at Carcassonne in the form of a Protestant crisis. Duke Henri I de Montmorency, the Governor of the Languedoc, joined the Reformed side in 1574. On the Catholic side, the Duke Anne de Joyeuse became head of the Catholic League. In September 1632, Henri II de Montmorency fought against the royal troops at the Battle of Castelnaudary and was defeated. He was condemned to death and executed at Toulouse.

The creation of the department

The present department is one of the original 83 departments created by the Constituent Assembly during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from part of the former province of Languedoc.
Administrative divisions were amended by the Act of 28 Pluviôse of Year 8, which created four arrondissements and reduced the number of cantons from 45 to 31.