Toulouse

Toulouse (fr. Toulouse) is a commune in the South-West of France, divided in half by the Garonne River and located near the border with Spain.

The violet culture development in the nineteenth century led to the fact that they chose this flower as the city’s emblem and the city itself earned its “pink city” name.

Toulouse has historically been the capital of the Visigoth kingdom (an early feudal state entity, historically the first of the so-called barbarian kingdoms that developed on the territory of the Western Roman Empire during its collapse in the 5th century. The capitals were Barcelona, Toulouse, Toledo, Narbonne, it is the Languedoc historical capital as well.

Toulouse is the capital of the Occitan’s Upper Garonne department and the Toulouse metropolis headquarters (a metropolis that unites part of the Toulouse agglomeration in Upper Garonne and has 37 municipalities) today.

Toulouse is France’s fourth most populous municipality after Paris, Marseille and Lyon. About 1.4 million residents lived in the municipality in 2015.

City History

The Gallic peoples confederation occupied West Languedoc from the middle of the third century BC, long before the Roman settlement; there is the belief that they were the first settlers of Old Toulouse, which was located several kilometers to the South from the modern Toulouse. Local settlers had trade relations with Spain, Italy and the rest of Gaul; they exchanged wine, wheat, leather and metal products.

Romans conquered Toulouse (Tolosa in Latin) in 107 BC. The Gallo-Romans built here, as in other large cities, aqueducts, as well as a theater amphitheater and roman baths buildings. They surrounded the city by the huge brick wall; some parts of it still remain.

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