The History of the Languedoc:   the Celts

Around 400 BC the Mediterranean coast was occupied by ibero-celtic and celtic tribes, the Volques.

Much of our information about the Volques comes from Latin authors, who mention that in the area we now know as Roussilon the Volques lived in the upper part of the plain and the valleys. The Volques Tectosages settled around Toulouse, and the Volques Arécomiques around Nîmes and the Helviens in the Ardèche. Other celtic tribes, the Sardones, settled in the plain around Château-Roussillon and Elne.

The lifestyle seems to have been much the same for all tribes: a mixture of traditional hunting and gathering, along with fishing, growing cereals and raising animals, along with small scale pottery and metal work.

Carcassonne, although of earlier foundation, owes its name to the Celts. For them it was Carsac.

In the Second century BC a conflict developed between the inhabitants of Marsielle and the Celtic incomers. Marseille apealed to the new superpower of the Mediterranean Sea, the Romans. Soon they would arive to found their own colony around the Gulf of Lyon.

For Hannibal's visit to the Languedoc with his elephants, on his way to the Alps, click here