France is weird. Why is it the biggest sea country in the world? Why was it the most powerful? Why is it not even the most powerful in Europe anymore? Why is it the only country in the continent that belongs both to the north and the south? While most nations in the continent have formed in the last couple of centuries, France has been around for over a thousand years. Why so long?
What a gem you hid in the footnote “The issue is not only what the reality is. It’s also how reality is perceived.” This is the crux of so much human behavior at any scale. The extent unexamined past conditions our future. It’s why Buddhists joke “Don’t believe everything you think”. BTW section 5 with the maybes and consequences is incredible. It’s like an exercise in reverse futurism. How do you lay that out? A massive white board?
Thank you, this is very useful feedback! I’ll explore more that footnote then :)
For the counterfactuals, I just run the logic forward. Since the more valuable piece was northern france, you guess what would have happened to france without the south. You can start at any point. I started in the Middle Ages but I could have gone ten times further.
For example, you don’t even get the Romans in Gaul, which probably means they never really reach either Gaul, Germany, or England. That, in turn, means technological diffusion takes centuries more. It also might have meant that Romans would have better protections, and might have lasted longer. I’m both cases, you don’t get 1700s england kick start the industrial Revolution, it would have come later.
It's also fun to point out that the power and economic weight of France was great enough by the 17th century that it had become possible to *actually build a canal* from Toulouse to the Mediterranean. The Canal du Midi today is mostly just for tourism (the river cruise is remarkably fun), but when it opened in 1681 it was the first inland river route from the Atlantic Garrone river system to the Mediterranean. Technically, the canal was about 200m rise with around 80 to 90 locks (fewer today), and was fed by a perennial water source in the Massif Central so as to be a manageable flow year round. The basic design is pretty much exactly what wound up being implemented in Panama over two centuries later. It's really remarkable civil engineering, especially for its day, and it's worth a visit if you're ever in that part of France.
One question : have you ever thought of publishing a book compiling all your geographical-historical articles ? My daughter is 1,5-year-old and a day will come when I would love to read such a book to her ;) In any case, thank you and keep it up
I do have some big regions I’m missing (Eg LatAm) and a bunch of big or special countries (UK DE AR AU BR…), but if I continue at this pace, I should be done in a couple of years, so maybe!
"This is the 2nd article in the series about France: If you missed the 1st one, go read France’s Bowels: A Secret Medieval Sect, an Angry Pope, an Opportunistic Lord, a Genocide, and Europe’s Destiny."
The last sentence of this one says "The 3rd and last article will cover France’s Cultural Cleansing: how it became the most centralized power in Europe."
The quick summary is that France purposefully eliminated the Occitan spoken in the south, and very consciously expanded French as the one language of the country.
Spain for example didn't, and you get Catalan, Galician, Basque, and the like.
About french colonies: what do you mean by "status"? I would use a rather different term and that would be "strategy". Thanks to colonies they have military ports everywhere.
France had not a colonial empire, but 2. The first one was lost in the 1700s.-early 1800s. It had started early (1500s) but never got anywhere (except for Haiti. Quebec was 20x smaller than equivalent English colonies, and with worse weather and land).
When France started at it again, it was in the mid-late 1800s, starting with Argelia, and focusing on Africa and a bit of Indochina. Most of the impulse was to “spread civilization” and to compete against other European powers for the status of a big empire, but never to invest in them or make a business out of them the way that Portugal, Brazil, Spain, and the Netherlands handled their own colonies.
I hesitate to mention a couple of minor corrections but it's the North Sea, not the Northern Sea. And towards the end when you say "Then, in the 1700s, it pioneered the ideas of the illustration" I think you mean the Enlightenment.
I was curious about that as well Jill - I think he means the rapid rise of the illustrated press as an agent of secularism but could be wrong? I picture the French too busy reading to colonize as aggressively at the Brits. ;)
That would certainly fit - the French are very into their BD (comics) two centuries later. I thought it might have been a confusion with /Iluminación/ in Spanish.
Mildly interesting geography/genetics fact to add to all this : on 23andme, they put french and german in the same genetic group.
Then they can divide by region (and they're very accurate), but the bigger group is "french and german", same as "british and irish" and "spanish and portuguese". Easy to see the effect of geography on population flux.
Though it's probably more correct to say both French and Germans are Celts, one who got conquered by and learned Latin, one who got conquered by and learned German (and then the German-speaking Celts conquered the Latin-speaking Celts).
It explains why we're not a fully latin culture, but still quite a bit. And maybe some of the defiance the south have towards "the north" (= everything north of Avignon :P).
this is an interesting article Tomas , it could be really two countries with Marseille the capital of the south.
There are several points that I want to raise about the colonial history of France and its effects until now , is it normal that several countries in Central and West Africa still not have an independent currency and and independent monetary policy '' ,les réserves de change de ces pays vont au trésor français '' until now.
In 1958 during the African tour of Mr de Gaulle to promote the story of the French African Community , he visited Guinea where the great Ahmed Séko Touré said no to this disguised independence and wanted the immediate independence of Guinea which was the only country that refused the Franc CFA , his famous historical words still resonate until now '' «Nous préférons la pauvreté dans la liberté à la richesse dans l’esclavage» ''
After that decision , the french government decided to make the secret '' opération Percil '' to destabilise the post independence government of Guinea , there is a book written by a former french minister called '' le ministre Afrique '' that talked about it , Guinea is the second producer of Bauxite and has also diamonds and gold .
I pass to Algeria , if I'm going to talk about it I need a long time , you said that French gave it its independence easily despite that 1 million of its citizens lived there. I'm sorry more than 1 million Algerians died to give the independence of their country , the atrocities that France committed in Algeria are well known by all , the Algerian war of independence was a struggle , you make it sound very easy..
I hope you will talk about the scramble of Africa , colonisation and the wealth of our great African continent taken by these countries ..
Not sure what you mean by this: Note that they did control what’s today southern France, but nothing beyond the mountains. That’s what limited the Romans to the greatest extent: the mountains.
What I said is that the mountains stopped Romans. Wherever there were easy passes across mountains is what they could conquer. It turns out that France has 2 such passes. The one through Lyons is the one they used to conquer northern France and Western Germany / BENELUX today
What a gem you hid in the footnote “The issue is not only what the reality is. It’s also how reality is perceived.” This is the crux of so much human behavior at any scale. The extent unexamined past conditions our future. It’s why Buddhists joke “Don’t believe everything you think”. BTW section 5 with the maybes and consequences is incredible. It’s like an exercise in reverse futurism. How do you lay that out? A massive white board?
Thank you, this is very useful feedback! I’ll explore more that footnote then :)
For the counterfactuals, I just run the logic forward. Since the more valuable piece was northern france, you guess what would have happened to france without the south. You can start at any point. I started in the Middle Ages but I could have gone ten times further.
For example, you don’t even get the Romans in Gaul, which probably means they never really reach either Gaul, Germany, or England. That, in turn, means technological diffusion takes centuries more. It also might have meant that Romans would have better protections, and might have lasted longer. I’m both cases, you don’t get 1700s england kick start the industrial Revolution, it would have come later.
Agreed. It all fits together so plausibly.
It's also fun to point out that the power and economic weight of France was great enough by the 17th century that it had become possible to *actually build a canal* from Toulouse to the Mediterranean. The Canal du Midi today is mostly just for tourism (the river cruise is remarkably fun), but when it opened in 1681 it was the first inland river route from the Atlantic Garrone river system to the Mediterranean. Technically, the canal was about 200m rise with around 80 to 90 locks (fewer today), and was fed by a perennial water source in the Massif Central so as to be a manageable flow year round. The basic design is pretty much exactly what wound up being implemented in Panama over two centuries later. It's really remarkable civil engineering, especially for its day, and it's worth a visit if you're ever in that part of France.
I went to carcassonne but didn’t visit it. I will next time. Thx!
Haha - Ami, levez-vous; Nous allons faire le voyage!
(obscure reference to poem about Carcassonne by Gustave Nadaud for those of us who aren't French poetry nerds).
Great piece of article as always !!
One question : have you ever thought of publishing a book compiling all your geographical-historical articles ? My daughter is 1,5-year-old and a day will come when I would love to read such a book to her ;) In any case, thank you and keep it up
It’s starting to cross my mind indeed!
I do have some big regions I’m missing (Eg LatAm) and a bunch of big or special countries (UK DE AR AU BR…), but if I continue at this pace, I should be done in a couple of years, so maybe!
There was no Roman Empire in 62 BC. In 62 BC it was the Roman Republic.
True! Correcting
Great article, thank you !
Could you briefly explain why France’s destiny is to merge with Germany ?
Is it based on geography too ?
This is France’s only threat, where it doesn’t have any protection, and from its last three major military losses came from.
For its security, it either needs to undermine Germany or unite with it.
"This is the 2nd article in the series about France: If you missed the 1st one, go read France’s Bowels: A Secret Medieval Sect, an Angry Pope, an Opportunistic Lord, a Genocide, and Europe’s Destiny."
Page not found...
Thanks, weird
https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/frances-bowels
Did the third one ever get published? I can’t find it.
I don’t even remember what I said in the article… I only recall 2 articles on France, but did I promise something else?
The last sentence of this one says "The 3rd and last article will cover France’s Cultural Cleansing: how it became the most centralized power in Europe."
Ah yeah I never wrote this.
The quick summary is that France purposefully eliminated the Occitan spoken in the south, and very consciously expanded French as the one language of the country.
Spain for example didn't, and you get Catalan, Galician, Basque, and the like.
France had that diversity. It stomped it out.
This one would certainly be an extremely interesting and useful article! I surely hope you'll write it sooner or later
Thanks for the link Tomas.
Great site btw.
Great article!
About french colonies: what do you mean by "status"? I would use a rather different term and that would be "strategy". Thanks to colonies they have military ports everywhere.
France had not a colonial empire, but 2. The first one was lost in the 1700s.-early 1800s. It had started early (1500s) but never got anywhere (except for Haiti. Quebec was 20x smaller than equivalent English colonies, and with worse weather and land).
When France started at it again, it was in the mid-late 1800s, starting with Argelia, and focusing on Africa and a bit of Indochina. Most of the impulse was to “spread civilization” and to compete against other European powers for the status of a big empire, but never to invest in them or make a business out of them the way that Portugal, Brazil, Spain, and the Netherlands handled their own colonies.
Sorry for the late reply, I didn't notice the notification.
In my response, I was referring to our days: they're keeping colonies to have "control" in both oceans.
Excelente explicación y resultados. Mil gracias de nuevo y mi admiración ¡¡
Super interesting article, very informative read.
I hesitate to mention a couple of minor corrections but it's the North Sea, not the Northern Sea. And towards the end when you say "Then, in the 1700s, it pioneered the ideas of the illustration" I think you mean the Enlightenment.
I was curious about that as well Jill - I think he means the rapid rise of the illustrated press as an agent of secularism but could be wrong? I picture the French too busy reading to colonize as aggressively at the Brits. ;)
That would certainly fit - the French are very into their BD (comics) two centuries later. I thought it might have been a confusion with /Iluminación/ in Spanish.
Ilustración! That’s it indeed.
Ah thx! I appreciate. Corrected :)
Mildly interesting geography/genetics fact to add to all this : on 23andme, they put french and german in the same genetic group.
Then they can divide by region (and they're very accurate), but the bigger group is "french and german", same as "british and irish" and "spanish and portuguese". Easy to see the effect of geography on population flux.
The French are Germans who learned Latin. ;)
Though it's probably more correct to say both French and Germans are Celts, one who got conquered by and learned Latin, one who got conquered by and learned German (and then the German-speaking Celts conquered the Latin-speaking Celts).
Indeed !
It explains why we're not a fully latin culture, but still quite a bit. And maybe some of the defiance the south have towards "the north" (= everything north of Avignon :P).
I hadn’t made that connection. You’re right! Thx for sharing.
this is an interesting article Tomas , it could be really two countries with Marseille the capital of the south.
There are several points that I want to raise about the colonial history of France and its effects until now , is it normal that several countries in Central and West Africa still not have an independent currency and and independent monetary policy '' ,les réserves de change de ces pays vont au trésor français '' until now.
In 1958 during the African tour of Mr de Gaulle to promote the story of the French African Community , he visited Guinea where the great Ahmed Séko Touré said no to this disguised independence and wanted the immediate independence of Guinea which was the only country that refused the Franc CFA , his famous historical words still resonate until now '' «Nous préférons la pauvreté dans la liberté à la richesse dans l’esclavage» ''
After that decision , the french government decided to make the secret '' opération Percil '' to destabilise the post independence government of Guinea , there is a book written by a former french minister called '' le ministre Afrique '' that talked about it , Guinea is the second producer of Bauxite and has also diamonds and gold .
you can read more here Mr Tomas
https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/afrique/politique-africaine/28-septembre-1958-le-jour-ou-la-guinee-a-dit-non-a-de-gaulle_3055865.html
I pass to Algeria , if I'm going to talk about it I need a long time , you said that French gave it its independence easily despite that 1 million of its citizens lived there. I'm sorry more than 1 million Algerians died to give the independence of their country , the atrocities that France committed in Algeria are well known by all , the Algerian war of independence was a struggle , you make it sound very easy..
I hope you will talk about the scramble of Africa , colonisation and the wealth of our great African continent taken by these countries ..
Not sure what you mean by this: Note that they did control what’s today southern France, but nothing beyond the mountains. That’s what limited the Romans to the greatest extent: the mountains.
You know that the Roman empire reached a big part of the Netherlands? This above, does not sound correctly. There is a map here that shows that the Roman empire in 117AD stretched until the Netherlands: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Atlas_of_the_Netherlands#/media/File:Pre_Migration_Age_Germanic.png
Of course
What I said is that the mountains stopped Romans. Wherever there were easy passes across mountains is what they could conquer. It turns out that France has 2 such passes. The one through Lyons is the one they used to conquer northern France and Western Germany / BENELUX today
Where do you find those beautiful maps, so acute and detailed ?
Trade secret!