Last modified: 2009-02-28 by ivan sache
Keywords: occitania | occitanie | star: 7 points (yellow) | cross: toulouse | felibrige | partit nationalista occitan | provence |
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![[Occitania flag]](../images/e/eu-occit.gif)
![[Occitania flag]](../images/e/eu-occi1.gif)
Occitan flag
Left, traditional design - Image by Pierre Gay, 24 April 2003
Right, modern design - Image by Hervé Rochard, 12 November 2003
See also:
Occitania is the name given to the area where Langue d'Oc was (and sometimes is still) spoken, mostly formed by 32 departements of Southern France. Related languages are or were also spoken in the Aran valley in Catalonia, Piemonte alpine valleys and the Calabrian city of Guardia Piemontese in Italy and some villages in Wurtemberg (Germany, now extinct).
According to the maedievist P. Bec (entry Langues et
littératures occitanes in Encyclopaedia
Universalis, 1998), Langue d'Oc can be divided into three main
dialects:
- Northern Occitan, itself divided into Limousin,
which was spoken in the traditional provinces of
Limousin and
Marche; Auvergnat, which was
spoken in the traditional provinces of
Auvergne and
Bourbonnais; and Provençal
Alpin, which was spoken in the traditional province of
Dauphiny
- Median Occitan, which is the most closely related to
the classical Langue d'Oc, itself divided into Languedocien,
which was spoken in the traditional provinces of
Languedoc,
Guyenne,
County of Foix and
Roussillon; and
Provençal, which was spoken in the traditional
provinces of Provence,
Comtat Venaissin and
County of Nice
- Gascon, which is the less related to the classical
Langue d'Oc, and was spoken in the traditional provinces of
Gascony and
Béarn.
Ivan Sache, 2 December 2003
Félibrige is a cultural movement promoting the rebirth of the Occitan language. The forerunners of the movement were Abbot Millot
(Histoire littéraire des troubadours, 1774), Fabre d'Olivet and Raynouard (Choix de poésies originales des troubadours, 1816-1821). Anthologies (Bouquet provençaou, 1823) and the review Lou Tambourinaire et le Ménestrel, published in Marseilles in 1841 also
predated Félibrige.
In 1851, Joseph Roumanille (1818-1891), who had published in Avignon Li
Margarideto (1847), founded the review Li Prouvençalo. He organized in 1853 in Aix-en-Provence poetical contests based on the troubadours' tradition.
Félibrige was founded on 21 May 1854 in the castle of Font-Ségugne, near Avignon, by the seven young poets Joseph Roumanille, Frédéric Mistral (1830-1914), Théodore Aubanel (1829-1886), Anselme Mathieu (1828-1895), Alphonse Tavan (1833-1905), Paul Giéra (1816-1861) and Jean Brunet (1823-1894). The name
Félibrige was proposed by Mistral, based on an old cantilena portraying the Blessed Virgin saying she found a son émé li sét félibres de la lei (among the seven Doctors of the Law, according to Mistral's interpretation).
The aims of Félibrige were the restoration of Occitan, its use in original litterature works and its recognition as a common Southern language. The first publication by Félibrige was Armana
Prouvençaou (Provencal Almanach, 1855). The first statutes of the movements were written in 1876 by Roumanille, as well as the orthographic rules of Occitan by Mistral. Félibrige was led by Provencals but each of the other Occitan domains
should have its own maintenance led by a syndic: Languedoc,
Auvergne-Limousin, Gascony-Béarn, Guyenne-Périgord, Velay and Roussillon.
Today, Félibrige is led by the capoulié, elected by a consistoire of 50 majoraux. The election is held each year in a different town on St. Estelle Day (21 May).
Dissident organizations seceded from Félibrige. In 1876, a
federalist branch seceded in Languedoc around Pastor Napoléon Peyrat, an historian of the Albigensian Crusade and the poets Auguste Fourès and Xavier de Ricard. They published La Lauseta (The Lark) as the armanac dal patrioto langadoucian (Almanach of the Languedocian Patriot). In 1877, L'Escolo del Mar (The School of the Sea), another dissident branch, was founded in Marseilles by Auguste Marin and Valère Bernard. In Paris, the two associations La Cigale (The Cicada, 1876) and The Félibrige de Paris (1879) followed the original traditions of Félibrige.
Félibrige produced before the Second World War several famous
writers and dramatically influenced the French literature (for instance
by the way of Alphonse Daudet and Paul Arène).
Occitanism appeared in 1923 with the review Oc as a reaction against the traditionalism of Félibrige. The Societat d'Estudis Occitans (Society for Occitan Studies, 1931) became later the Institute for Occitan studies. The Occitanists rejected Mistral's ritualism ("Mistralism") and its excessive specific characteristics to promote a global strategy of defense of Occitan and the graphic unification of written Occitan. The review Occitania
(1934-1939), founded by Charles Camproux, Ernest Vieu, Léon Cordes, Jean Lesaffre, Max Rouquette and Roger Barthe, considered occitanism as a
socio-political question.
In 1967, Robert Lafond founded the Comité Occitan d'Études et d'Actions (Occitan Committee for Study and Action) and wrote La Révolution régionaliste. Since 1968,
occitanism interested more and more people and several political parties
were founded, such as Lutte Occitane, the Parti National Occitan and
Volem Viure an Pais (We want to live in our country).
Source: Dictionnaire historique, thématique et technique des littératures française et étrangères, anciennes et modernes (Larousse, 1989)
Ivan Sache, 28 April 2003
The original Occitan flag is the flag of the traditional province
of Languedoc and of its historical capital, Toulouse. The flag is red with a yellow cross called the Cross of Toulouse.
This flag appears in the Flags of Aspirant
Peoples chart [eba94], #65, with
the following caption:
OCCITANIA (Langue d'Oc)
South France
Ivan Sache, 14 September 1999
The seven-pointed star was added to the flag by the Partit Nationalista Occitan (PNO, Occitan Nationalist Party), a nationalist/separatist organisation founded in 1959. It allows to differentiate the Languedoc province and Occitania as a group of provinces including Auvergne, Gascony, Limousin, Provence and a part of Dauphiny. The flag is now in use by many Occitanists, not necessarily members of the PNO.
Joan-Francés Blanc 30 October 1996
Daniel Estieu (Un rapide aperçu du Félibrige) reports the official explanation of the seven-pointed star as a reference
to the seven poets who founded Félibrige movement
on 21 May 1854, St. Estella's Day (Estella means "star").
This foundation was described by Frédéric Mistral as
follows:
[...] all of that having been done, it was noticed, well, that the 21st of May, the day of our meeting, was St. Estelle's Day; and, like the Three Kings, acknowledging the mysterious influence of some high circumstances, we saluted the Star who presided the cradle of our Redemption.
However, Mistral's report invoking a piece of luck is not backed up by the facts: on 21 May 1854, only five of the seven founders of Félibrige attended the meeting. Estieu recalls the "magnetism" exerted by the number seven and that the Floral Games (Floralies) of Toulouse were reestablished by seven troubadours in 1323.
More recently, a new political meaning was given to the
Félibrige star. In a
debate
held in the French Senate on 8 April 1975, Senator Jean Nayrou said:
Félibrige spread step by step to Languedoc, Catalonia, Gascony, Périgord, etc., that is the seven regions which constitute it, symbolized by the seven branches of Félibrige star.
This is a reference to the seven branches of Félibrige, but there is no evidence that the seven points of the star originally referred to these branches. It must be noted that the number seven has a kind of mystical value among Félibrige, therefore several symbolic explanations can be presented.
Ivan Sache, 2 May 2003
![[Franco-Occitan flag]](../images/f/fr-froc.gif)
Franco-Occitan flag - Image by Ivan Sache, 3 October 2003
Thierry Gilabert reported a Franco-Occitan flag used in the town
of Lézignan-Corbières (Department of
Aude, Region
Languedoc-Roussillon, traditional province of
Languedoc). The flag is the French national
tricolore with the cross of Toulouse placed in the lower fly.
Lézignan is known for its wines (Corbières) and its Rugby
League (jeu à XIII) team. The town is located in the
middle of the area where the Albigensian
Crusade took place in the 13th century.
Ivan Sache, 3 October 2003
![[Provencal flag]](../images/f/fr!provf.gif)
Provencal flag - Image reconstructed (no original seen) by Ivan Sache, 9 May 2003
Pascal Vagnat found in the municipal archives of Marseilles a book mentioning a flag used by the Félibres in the 19th century as the Provencal flag. The flag is said to be azure blue with the Félibrige star in the middle.
Ivan Sache, 9 May 2003