Poitou Poetou (Poitevin) | |
|---|---|
 Flag .svg) Coat of arms | |
.svg) | |
| Country | France |
| Area | |
• Total | 19,709 km2 (7,610 sq mi) |
| Population | |
• Total | 1,375,356 |
| Time zone | CET |
| Count | 638–677,Guérin de Trèves 1403–1461,Charles VII of France |
Poitou (UK:/ˈpwʌtuː/PWUH-too,US:/pwɑːˈtuː/pwah-TOO,[2][3][4]French:[pwatu];Latin:Pictaviensis, Pictavia;Poitevin:Poetou) was aprovince of west-central France whose capital city wasPoitiers. Both Poitou and Poitiers are named after thePictones Gallic tribe.
The main historical cities arePoitiers (historical capital city),Châtellerault (France's kings' establishment in Poitou),Niort,La Roche-sur-Yon,Thouars, andParthenay.
Historically, Poitou was ruled by thecount of Poitou, a continuous line of which can be traced back to an appointment ofCharlemagne in 778. Amarshland called thePoitevin Marsh (FrenchMarais Poitevin) is located along theGulf of Poitou, on the west coast of France, just north ofLa Rochelle and west ofNiort.
At the conclusion of theBattle of Taillebourg in theSaintonge War, which was decisively won by the French, King Henry III of England recognized his loss of continentalPlantagenet territory to France. This was ratified by theTreaty of Paris of 1259, by which King Louis annexedNormandy,Maine,Anjou, and Poitou).
During the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, Poitou was a hotbed ofHuguenot (French Calvinist Protestant) activity among the nobility and bourgeoisie. The Protestants were discriminated against and brutally attacked during theFrench Wars of Religion (1562–1598). Under theEdict of Nantes, such discrimination was temporarily suspended but this measure was repealed by the French Crown.
Some of the French colonists, later known asAcadians, who settled beginning in 1604 in eastern North America came from southern Poitou. They established settlements in what is nowNova Scotia, and later inNew Brunswick—both of which were taken over in the later 18th century by the English, (after their 1763 victory in theSeven Years' War).
After the revocation of theEdict of Nantes in 1685, the French RomanCatholic Church conducted a strongCounter-Reformation effort. In 1793, this effort had contributed to the three-year-long open revolt against the French Revolutionary Government in the Bas-Poitou (Département ofVendée). Similarly, duringNapoleon'sHundred Days in 1815, the Vendée stayed loyal to the Restoration Monarchy of KingLouis XVIII. Napoleon dispatched 10,000 troops under GeneralJean Maximilien Lamarque topacify the region.
As noted by historian Andre Lampert:
"The persistent Huguenots of 17th Century Poitou and the fiercely Catholic rebellious Royalists of what came be the Vendée of the late 18th Century had ideologies very different, indeed diametrically opposed to each other. The common thread connecting both phenomena is a continuing assertion of a local identity and opposition to the central government inParis, whatever its composition and identity. (...) In the region whereLouis XIII andLouis XIV had encountered stiff resistance, theHouse of Bourbon gained loyal and militant supporters exactly when it had been overthrown and when a Bourbon loyalty came to imply a local loyalty in opposition to the new central government, that ofRobespierre."[5]
Media related toPoitou at Wikimedia Commons| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
46°38′55″N0°14′52″W / 46.6486°N 0.2478°W /46.6486; -0.2478
.svg)
