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Provence is a former province and is now a region of southeastern France, located on the Mediterranean Sea adjacent to France's border with Italy. It is now part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur. The traditional region of Provence encompasses the départements of Var, Vaucluse, and Bouches-du-Rhône in addition to parts of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and Alpes-Maritimes.1 History
Provence has been inhabited since prehistoric times. It was known in ancient times as part of Narbonensis, inhabited by Ligurians and later Celts. The coastal strip was settled by GreeksSee The Greeks for the financial term for the set of measures derived from the Black-Scholes option pricing formula, named for the use of the Greek alphabet to denote parameters. Greeks in Ancient History In Latin literature, Graeci (or Greeks in English) and Phoenicians from around 600 BC onwards, with MarseilleMarseilles redirects here. There is also Marseilles, Illinois. Marseille (English Marseilles Provencal Marsilha is the second largest city in France. Located in the former province of Provence and on the Mediterranean sea, it is France's largest commercia becoming one of the great trading cities of the Mediterranean. It was progressively settled by the Romans from the 2nd century BC3rd century BC 2nd century BC 1st century BC other centuries) ( 2nd millennium BC 1st millennium BC 1st millennium AD) Events BC 168 Battle of Pydna Macedonian phalanx defeated by Romans BC 148 Rome conquers Macedonia BC 146 Rome destroys Carthage in the, eventually becoming a provinceA Roman province (Latin, provincia was the largest territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's foreign possessions (beyond the Italian peninsula). The word province in modern English therefore has its origins in the term employed by the Roma of the Roman Empire60 and 400 with major cities. During this time only Dacia and Mesopotamia were added to the Empire but were lost before 300. The Roman Empire is the term conventionally used to describe the Roman state in the centuries following its reorganization under t. This gave it its name, from the Latin provincia, as Provence was one of the first and most romanised provinces of the Roman Empire.
Christianity arrived in Provence very early and the region was already extensively Christianised by the 3rd century AD, with numerous monasteries and churches being constructed. Provence fared badly in the aftermath of the fall of the Roman Empire, suffering repeated invasions: Visigoths in the 5th century, Franks in the 6th century and Arabs in the 8th century, as well as repeated raids by Berber pirates and slavers.
From 1032 to 1246 the county was part of the Holy Roman Empire. It became a fief of the French Crown from 1246, under the rule of the Angevin dynasty. It was definitively incorporated into the French royal domain in 1486 after the of Charles of Maine . Significant enclaves existed within Provence for many years afterwards: Orange remained under the control of the House of Orange-Nassau until 1672; the Comtat Venaissin, centred on Avignon, was under Papal rule until 1791; and Nice and Menton were not added to Provence until as late as 1860.
The now-extinct title of Count of Provence belonged to local families of Frankish origin, to the House of Barcelona, to the House of Anjou and to a cadet branch of the House of Valois.
