Bygone France

In his book, The Discovery of France, author, Graham Robb, states that until the 19th century, France comprised hundreds of small, autonomous republics. Most were in fact, simply isolated hamlets, which while technically part of France, did not pay any taxes to the government. Few people in these hamlets identified as being French, in the sense of France being a single, unified nation.

Even at the turn of the 20^th century, two-thirds of the population of France was made up of largely isolated communities containing fewer than a hundred people. When folk did travel, it was rarely more than a few miles from where they were born because there was simply no need to go further, plus without the benefit of modern transport, journeys took a long time – time which could be better spent managing the land, flocks, and crops.

These days, a fifth of France’s entire population lives in the Parisian region alone.