Occitania

Occitania is the historical region in Western and Southern Europe where Occitan was historically the main language spoken,[1] and where it is sometimes still used, for the most part as a second language. This cultural area roughly encompasses the southern third of France, as well as part of Spain (Aran Valley), Monaco, and smaller parts of Italy . Occitania has been recognized as a linguistic and cultural concept since the Middle Ages, but has never been a legal nor a political entity under this name, although the territory was united in Roman times as the Seven Provinces and in the Early Middle Ages (Aquitanica or the Visigothic Kingdom of Toulouse,or the share of Louis the Pious following Thionville divisio regnorum in 806

Currently about 200,000–800,000 people out of 16 million living in the area are either native or proficient speakers of Occitan,[7] although the languages more usually spoken in the area are French, Catalan, Spanish and Italian. Since 2006, the Occitan language has been an official language of Catalonia, which includes the Aran Valley where Occitan gained official status in 1990.