Provence was inhabited from an exceptionally early age: primitive stone tools more than a million years old were found near Roquebrune-Cap-Martin. Neanderthal hunters occupied the Mediterranean coast from about 90,000 BC to 40,000 BC, living in caves such as Grottes de l'Observatoire in Monaco. Modern man arrived with creative flair in 30,000 BC. The ornate wall paintings inside the decorated Grotte Cosquer, near Marseille, date from 20,000 BC, while the outstanding collection of 30,000 petroglyphs decorating Mont Bégo in the Vallée des Merveilles dates back to 1800–1500 BC.
Archaeologists have found that the people living around Châteauneuf-les-Martigues, northwest of Marseille, about 6000 to 4500 years ago were among the first ever to domesticate wild sheep, allowing them to shift from a nomadic to a settled lifestyle.
Massalia (Marseille) was colonised around 600 BC by Greeks from Phocaea in Asia Minor; from the 4th century BC they established more trading posts along the coast at Antipolis (Antibes), Olbia (Hyères), Athenopolis (St-Tropez), Nikaia (Nice), Monoïkos (Monaco) and Glanum (near St-Rémy-de-Provence). They brought olives and grapevines to the region.
While Hellenic civilisation was developing on the coast, the Celts penetrated northern Provence. They mingled with ancient Ligurians to create a Celto-Ligurian stronghold around Entremont; its influence extended as far south as Draguignan.
In 125 BC the Romans helped the Greeks defend Massalia against invading Celto-Ligurians. Their victory marked the start of the Gallo-Roman era and the creation of Provincia Gallia Transalpina, the first Roman provincia (province), from which the name Provence is derived.
Provincia Gallia Transalpina, later Provincia Narbonensis, embraced all of southern France from the Alps to the Mediterranean and the Pyrenees. In 122 BC the Romans destroyed the Ligurian capital of Entremont and established the Roman stronghold of Aquae Sextiae Salluviorum (Aix-en-Provence) at its foot. Around 188BC, they began construction of the Via Domitia, the first Roman road in Gaul, which stretched all the way from the Alps via the Durance Valley, Apt, Arles, Nîmes, and Narbonne, where it intersected with the Via Aquitania to the Atlantic Coast.
The construction of the road helped Rome's further conquest of Gaul by enabling movement of troops and supplies, but it wasn't completely conquered until Julius Caesar’s final victorious campaign from 58BC to 51BC. Massalia, which had retained its independence following the creation of Provincia, was incorporated by Caesar in 49 BC. In 14 BC the still-rebellious Ligurians were defeated by Augustus Caesar, who celebrated by building a monument at La Turbie in 6 BC. Arelate (Arles) became the regional capital.
Under the emperor Augustus, vast amphitheatres were built at Arelate, Nemausus (Nîmes), Forum Julii (Fréjus) and Vasio Vocontiorum (Vaison-la-Romaine). Triumphal arches were raised at Arausio (Orange), Cabelio (Cavaillon), Carpentorate (Carpentras) and Glanum, and a series of aqueducts was constructed. The 275m-long Pont du Gard was part of a 50km-long system of canals built around 19 BC by Agrippa, Augustus’ deputy, to bring water from Uzès to Nîmes.
Christianity – brought to the region, according to Provençal legend, by Mary Magdalene, Mary Jacob and Mary Salome, who sailed into Stes-Maries-de-la-Mer in AD 40 – penetrated the region, was adopted by the Romans and continued to spread over the next few hundred years.
After the collapse of the Roman Empire in AD 476, Provence was invaded by various Germanic tribes. In the early 9th century the Saracens (an umbrella term adopted locally to describe Muslim invaders such as Turks, Moors and Arabs) emerged as a warrior force to be reckoned with. Attacks along the Maures coast, Niçois hinterland and more northern Alps persuaded villagers to take refuge in the hills. Many of Provence’s hilltop villages date from this chaotic period. In AD 974 the Saracen fortress at La Garde Freinet was defeated by William the Liberator (Guillaume Le Libérateur), count of Arles, who consequently extended his feudal control over the entire region, marking the return of peace and unity to Provence, which became a marquisate. In 1032 it joined the Holy Roman Empire.
The marquisate of Provence was later split in two: the north fell to the counts of Toulouse from 1125, and the Catalan counts of Barcelona gained control of the southern part (stretching from the Rhône to the River Durance and from the Alps to the sea). This became the county of Provence (Comté de Provence). Raymond Bérenger V (1209–45) was the first Catalan count to reside permanently in Aix (the capital since 1186). In 1229 he conquered Nice and in 1232 he founded Barcelonnette. After Bérenger’s death the county passed to the House of Anjou, under which it enjoyed great prosperity.
In 1274 Comtat Venaissin (Carpentras and its Vaucluse hinterland) was ceded to Pope Gregory X in Rome. In 1309 French-born Clément V (r 1305–14) moved the papal headquarters from feud-riven Rome to Avignon. A tour of the papal palace illustrates how resplendent a period this was for the city, which hosted nine pontiffs between 1309 and 1376.
The death of Pope Gregory XI led to the Great Schism (1378–1417), during which rival popes resided at Rome and Avignon and spent most of their energies denouncing and excommunicating each other. Even after the schism was settled and a pope established in Rome, Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin remained under papal rule until 1792.
The arts in Provence flourished under the popes. A university was established in Avignon as early as 1303, followed by a university in Aix a century later. In 1327 Italian poet Petrarch (1304–74) encountered his muse, Laura, in Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. During the reign of Good King René, king of Naples (1434–80), French became the courtly language.
In 1481 René’s successor, his nephew Charles III, died heirless and Provence was ceded to Louis XI of France. In 1486 the state of Aix ratified Provence’s union with France, and the centralist policies of the French kings saw the region’s autonomy greatly reduced. Aix Parliament, a French administrative body, was created in 1501.
A period of instability ensued, as a visit to the synagogue in Carpentras testifies: Jews living in French Provence fled to ghettos in Carpentras, Pernes-les-Fontaines, L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, Cavaillon or Avignon. All were part of the pontifical enclave of Comtat Venaissin, where papal protection remained assured until 1570.
An early victim of the Reformation that swept Europe in the 1530s and the consequent Wars of Religion (1562–98) was the Luberon. In April 1545 the populations of 11 Waldensian (Vaudois) villages in the Luberon were massacred. Numerous clashes followed between the staunchly Catholic Comtat Venaissin and its Huguenot (Protestant) neighbours to the north around Orange.
In 1580, as in much of Europe, plague devastated the region, causing tens of thousands of deaths – a problem that continued to recur over the ensuing decades.
The Edict of Nantes in 1598 (which recognised Protestant control of certain areas, including Lourmarin in the Luberon) brought an uneasy peace to the region – until its revocation by Louis XIV in 1685. Full-scale persecution of Protestants ensued.
In 1720, Marseille was hit by another devastating outbreak of plague. The disease spread from a merchant ship after the city’s chief magistrate, owner of the ship’s cargo, ignored quarantine measures to ensure his goods made it to the local fair. Half the city's population died.
The close of the century was marked by the French Revolution in 1789: as the National Guard from Marseille marched north to defend the Revolution, a merry tune composed in Strasbourg several months earlier for the war against Prussia – 'Chant de Guerre de l’Armée du Rhin' (War Song of the Rhine Army) – sprang from their lips. France’s stirring national anthem, 'La Marseillaise', was born.
Provence was divided into three départements (administrative divisions) in 1790: Var, Bouches du Rhône and the Basse-Alpes. Two years later papal Avignon and Comtat Venaissin were annexed by France, making way for the creation of Vaucluse.
In 1793 the Armée du Midi marched into Nice and declared it French territory. France also captured Monaco, until then a recognised independent state ruled by the Grimaldi family. When Toulon was besieged by the English, it was thanks to the efforts of a dashing young Corsican general named Napoléon Bonaparte (Napoléon I) that France recaptured it.
The Reign of Terror that swept through France between September 1793 and July 1794 saw religious freedoms revoked, churches desecrated and cathedrals turned into ‘Temples of Reason’. In the secrecy of their homes, people handcrafted thumbnail-sized biblical figurines, hence the inglorious creation of the santon.
In 1814 France lost the territories it had seized in 1793. The County of Nice was ceded to Victor Emmanuel I, King of Sardinia. It remained under Sardinian protectorship until 1860, when an agreement between Napoléon III and the House of Savoy helped drive the Austrians from northern Italy, prompting France to repossess Savoy and the area around Nice. In Monaco the Treaty of Paris restored the rights of the Grimaldi royal family; from 1817 until 1860 the principality also fell under the protection of the Sardinian king.
Meanwhile, the Allied restoration of the House of Bourbon to the French throne at the Congress of Vienna (1814–15), following Napoléon I’s abdication and exile to Elba, was rudely interrupted by the return of the emperor. Following his escape from Elba in 1815, Napoléon landed at Golfe-Juan on 1 March with a 1200-strong army. He proceeded northwards, passing through Cannes, Grasse, Castellane, Digne-les-Bains and Sisteron en route to his triumphal return to Paris on 20 May. Napoléon’s glorious ‘Hundred Days’ back in power ended with the Battle of Waterloo and his return to exile. He died in 1821.
The Second Empire (1852–70) brought to the region a revival in all things Provençal, a movement spearheaded by Maillane-born poet Frédéric Mistral. Rapid economic growth was another hallmark: Nice, which had become part of France in 1860, became Europe’s fastest-growing city thanks to its booming tourism. The city was particularly popular with the English aristocracy, who followed their queen’s example of wintering on the Riviera's shores. European royalty followed soon after. The train line reached Toulon in 1856, followed by Nice in 1864, the same year work started on a coastal road from Nice to Monaco.
In neighbouring Monaco the Grimaldi family gave up its claim over its former territories of Menton and Roquebrune in 1861 in exchange for France’s recognition of its status as an independent principality. Four years later Monte Carlo Casino opened and Monaco leapt from being Europe’s poorest state to one of its richest.
The Third Republic ushered in the glittering belle époque, with art nouveau architecture, a whole field of artistic ‘isms’ including impressionism, and advances in science and engineering. Wealthy French, English, American and Russian tourists and tuberculosis sufferers (for whom the only cure was sunlight and sea air) discovered the coast. The intensity and clarity of the region’s colours and light appealed to many painters.
No blood was spilled on southern French soil during WWI. Soldiers were conscripted from the region, however, and the human losses included two out of every 10 Frenchmen between 20 and 45 years of age. With its primarily tourist-based economy, the Côte d’Azur recovered more quickly from the postwar financial crisis than France’s more industrial north.
The Côte d’Azur sparkled as an avant-garde centre in the 1920s and 1930s, with artists pushing into the new fields of cubism and surrealism, Le Corbusier rewriting the architectural textbook and foreign writers thronging to the liberal coast.
The coast’s nightlife gained a reputation for being cutting edge, with everything from jazz clubs to striptease. Rail and road access to the south improved: the railway line between Digne-les-Bains and Nice was completed, and in 1922 the luxurious Train Bleu made its first run from Calais, via Paris, to the coast. The train only had 1st-class carriages and was quickly dubbed the ‘train to paradise’.
The roaring twenties hailed the start of the summer season on the Côte d’Azur. Outdoor swimming pools were built, sandy beaches cleared of seaweed, and sunbathing sprang into fashion after a bronzed Coco Chanel appeared on the coast in 1923, draped over the arm of the Duke of Westminster. France lifted its ban on gambling, prompting the first casino to open on the coast in the Palais de la Méditerranée (today a hotel) on Nice’s Promenade des Anglais in 1927. With the advent of paid holidays for all French workers in 1936, even more tourists flocked to the region. Second- and 3rd-class seating were added to the Train Bleu.
With the onset of war, the Côte d’Azur’s glory days turned grey. On 3 September 1939 France and Britain declared war on Germany. But following the armistice treaty agreed with Hitler on 22 June 1940, southern France fell into the ‘free’ Vichy France zone, although Menton and the Vallée de La Roya were occupied by Italians. The Côte d’Azur – particularly Nice – immediately became a safe haven from war-torn occupied France; by 1942 some 43,000 Jews had descended on the coast to seek refuge. Monaco remained neutral for the duration of WWII.
On 11 November 1942 Nazi Germany invaded Vichy France. Provence was at war. At Toulon 73 ships, cruisers, destroyers and submarines -– the major part of the French fleet – were scuttled by their crews to prevent the Germans seizing them. Almost immediately, Toulon was overcome by the Germans and Nice was occupied by the Italians. In January 1943 the Marseille quarter of Le Panier was razed, its 40,000 inhabitants being given less than a day’s notice to pack up and leave. Those who didn’t were sent to Nazi concentration camps. The Resistance movement, particularly strong in Provence, was known in the region as maquis, after the Provençal scrub in which people hid.
Two months after D-Day, on 15 August 1944, Allied forces landed on the southern coast at beaches including Le Dramont near St-Raphaël, Cavalaire, Pampelonne and the St-Tropez peninsula. St-Tropez and Provence’s hinterland were almost immediately liberated, but it was only after five days of heavy fighting that Allied troops freed Marseille on 28 August (three days after the liberation of Paris). Toulon was liberated on 26 August, a week after French troops first attacked the port.
Italian-occupied areas in the Vallée de La Roya were only returned to France in 1947.
The Côte d’Azur (literally ‘Azure Coast’) gained its name in 1887 from the first guidebook published on the region. La Côte d’Azur was the work of Stéphane Liégeard (1830–1925), a lawyer-cum-aspiring-poet from Burgundy who lived in Cannes. The guide covered the coast from Menton to Hyères and was an instant hit. Its title, a reflection of the coast’s clear blue cloudless skies, became the hottest phrase in town and never disappeared. The Côte d’Azur is known as the French Riviera by most anglophones.
The 30-odd years following WWII saw unprecedented growth, creativity and optimism in France, and Provence and the Côte d'Azur were no exception. After a false start, Cannes' 1946 international film festival heralded the return of party madness. The 1950s and 1960s saw a succession of society events: the fairy-tale marriage of Monaco's prince to Hollywood film-legend Grace Kelly in 1956; Vadim’s filming of Et Dieu Créa la Femme (And God Created Woman) with a smouldering Brigitte Bardot in St-Tropez the same year; the creation of the bikini; the advent of topless sunbathing (and consequent nipple-covering with bottle tops to prevent arrest for indecent exposure); and Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald and Ray Charles appearing at the 1961 Juan-les-Pins jazz festival.
Rapid industrialisation marked the 1960s. A string of five hydroelectric plants was constructed on the banks of the River Durance and in 1964 Électricité de France (EDF), the French electricity company, dug a canal from Manosque to the Étang de Berre. The following year construction work began on a 100-sq-km petrochemical zone and an industrial port at Fos-sur-Mer, southern Europe’s most important. The first metro line opened in Marseille in 1977 and TGV high-speed trains reached the city in 1981.
From the 1970s mainstream tourism started making inroads into Provence’s rural heart. Concrete blocks sprang up along the coast and up on the ski slopes. The small flow of foreigners that had trickled into Provence backwaters to buy crumbling old mas (Provençal farmhouses) in the late 1970s had become an uncontrollable torrent by the 1980s. By the turn of the new millennium, the region was welcoming nine million tourists annually.
Writer Somerset Maugham had famously described Monaco as 'a sunny place for shady people', but over the course of the 1980s and 1990s many increasingly felt that this could apply to the region as a whole. Although it was well-known that the Italian, Russian and Corsican mafias all operated on the coast, their true extent was revealed after a series of corruption scandals, none more dramatic than the assassination of député (member of parliament) Yann Piat in 1994: she was shot in her Hyères constituency following her public denunciation of the Riviera mafia.
The same year, former Nice mayor Jacques Médecin, who had run the city from 1966 to 1990, was found guilty of income-tax evasion and misuse of public funds after being extradited from Uruguay where he'd fled. And in 1995 Bernard Tapie, the flamboyant owner of Olympique de Marseille football club, was found guilty of match fixing and sentenced to two years in jail.
Many now think that it was these high-profile corruption cases, combined with economic recession and growing unemployment, that helped fuel the rise of the extreme-right Front National (FN). Led by firebrand Jean-Marie Le Pen, infamous for having described the Holocaust as a 'detail of history', the FN won municipal elections in Toulon, Orange and Marignane in 1995, and Vitrolles in 1997. The party also gained 15.5% of votes in regional elections in 1998 and 14.7% in 2004.
The FN never succeeded in securing the presidency of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur région, but Le Pen’s success in the first round of presidential elections in 2002 – he landed 16.86% of votes, with his main support base in the south of France – shocked many people. He eventually lost in the second round, after a massive 80% turnout at the ballot boxes, and 82% of votes in favour of his opponent, Jacques Chirac.
The far right continues to exert a strong pull over the region's political fortunes; now run by Jean-Marie's daughter, Marine Le Pen, FN has recently polled strongly in several important elections – perhaps most notably in 2014, when it came within a whisker of taking control of Avignon.
No pan-European agreement has been more influential on the future map of Europe than the Treaty of Nice, a landmark treaty thrashed out by the then 15 European Union member states in late December 2000. Enforced from February 2003, the treaty laid the foundations for EU enlargement starting in 2004, determined the institutions necessary for its smooth running and – not without controversy – established a new system of voting in the Council of Ministers for the 25 EU countries from 1 November 2004.
Almost called atome (French for atom) rather than bikini after its pinprick size, the scanty little two-piece bathing suit was the 1946 creation of Cannes fashion designer Jacques Heim and automotive engineer Louis Réard. Top-and-bottom swimsuits had existed for centuries, but it was the French duo who plumped for the name bikini – after Bikini, an atoll in the Marshall Islands chosen by the USA in 1946 as a testing ground for atomic bombs.
Once wrapped around the curvaceous rear of 1950s sex-bomb Brigitte Bardot on St-Tropez’s Plage de Pampelonne, there was no looking back. The bikini was born.
c 90,000 BC
Neanderthal hunters occupy the Mediterranean coast; starting around 30,000 BC Cro-Magnons start decorating their caves.
600 BC
The Greeks colonise Massalia (now Marseille) and establish trading posts along the coast, bringing olive trees and grapevines to the region.
126–125 BC
Romans create Provincia Gallia Transalpina, from which Provence gets its name, and Provence joins the Roman Empire.
AD 400–900
The Roman Empire collapses and Germanic tribes invade Provence; Franks (hence the name ‘France’) encourage villagers to move uphill to avert Saracen attacks.
974–1032
William the Liberator extends his feudal control over Provence, which becomes a marquisate and joins the Holy Roman Empire.
1309–77
Pope Clément V moves the Holy Seat to Avignon, and nine pontiffs head the Roman Catholic church from there until 1377; ‘home’ is the Palais des Papes.
1481
King of Naples, Good King René’s nephew and successor, Charles III, dies heirless and Provence falls to Louis XI of France.
1530s
The Reformation sweeps through France, prompting the core of Catholicism to be questioned.
1539
French (rather than Provençal) is made the official administrative language of Provence.
1545
People of 11 Luberon villages are massacred under the terms of the Arrêt de Mérindol, a bill condemning anyone of Waldensian faith to death.
1560
Nîmes native Jean Nicot (1530–1600) becomes the first to import tobacco into France from Portugal, hence the word ‘nicotine’.
1562–98
The Wars of Religion see numerous bloody clashes between French Catholics and Protestants (Huguenots).
1598
Bourbon king Henry IV gives French Protestants freedom of conscience with the Edict of Nantes – to the horror of Catholic Paris and Roman Catholicism stronghold Avignon.
1720
The Great Plague of Marseille eventually leads to the death of more than half the city’s population, and the building of Le Mur de la Peste (Plague Wall).
1789–94
Revolutionaries storm the Bastille, leading to the beheading of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette and the Reign of Terror, seeing religious freedoms revoked.
1790–92
Provence is divided into three départements (which still exist today); Papal Avignon and Comtat Venaissin are annexed by France and Vaucluse is created.
1815
Exiled Napoléon Bonaparte escapes Elba and journeys in secret over the mountains near Digne-les-Bains and Gap to reclaim his title in Paris – it'll only last 100 days.
1848
In 1848 French revolutionaries adopt the red, white and blue tricolour of Martigues near Marseille as their own. France’s national flag is born.
1860
The County of Nice becomes part of French Provence. Meanwhile, European royalty winters in Nice, Europe’s fastest-growing city.
1914–18
The human cost of WWI is enormous: of the eight million French men called to arms, 1.3 million are killed and almost one million crippled.
1920s
The Côte d’Azur sparkles as Europe’s avant-garde centre and the luxurious Train Bleu (Blue Train) makes its first run from Calais to the Mediterranean coast.
1939–45
Nazi Germany occupies France, establishing a puppet state led by ageing WWI hero General Pétain in Vichy; Provence is liberated two months after D-Day.
1946
The first international film festival opens at Cannes’ old casino, and is a smashing success, helping revive postwar life on the coast.
1947
Vallée de La Roya, in eastern Provence, which had been occupied by the Italians during WWII, is returned to France.
1953
A 17-year-old Brigitte Bardot dons a bikini at the Cannes Film Festival, and starts a new fashion trend on the Côte d'Azur.
1956
Rainier Louis Henri Maxence Bertrand Grimaldi, Count of Polignac, aka Prince Rainier III of Monaco, weds his fairy-tale princess, Hollywood film legend Grace Kelly.
1981
The superfast TGV makes its first commercial journey from Paris to Lyon, breaking all speed records to complete the train journey in two hours instead of six.
2000
European leaders meet in Nice to thrash out future EU expansion. Not without controversy, they establish a new system of voting in the Council of Ministers.
2002
The French franc, first minted in 1360, is dumped on the scrap heap of history as the country adopts the euro as its official currency.
2004
A local diver uncovers the wreckage of the plane of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, author of Le Petit Prince, who plunged to his death in the Mediterranean in July 1944.
2005
After the end of a three-month mourning period for his father, Prince Albert II of Monaco is crowned monarch of the world’s second-smallest country.
2013
Marseille and Aix celebrate their tenures as joint Capitals of Culture, with major museum openings and celebratory events.
2014
City authorities in Nice announce bid for the Promenade des Anglais to become a World Heritage Site.