Gaillac (; ) is a commune in the Tarn

department Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

in southern France. It had in 2013 a population of 14,334 inhabitants. Its inhabitants are called Gaillacois.

Geography

Gaillac is a town situated between Toulouse, Albi and Montauban. It has gained much recognition due to the wines that bear the town's name. The river Tarn runs along the border of the town by the south, east and west. It lies 50 km north-east of Toulouse. It is a market town and is the commercial centre of the north-west of Tarn. The local wine of Gaillac, first made almost two thousand years ago, is of two official appellations (AOC). The terroir is made up of clay, limestone, sand and silex soils. Gaillac receives more sunshine than Bordeaux and is graced by a cool maritime climate. Duras is the name both of the grape that is native to this area and of an AOC and town just northwest of the two "Gaillac" designations.

History

The town was founded in the second century CE by the Gauls who created a river port where they exported their wine into

Gallia Narbonensis Gallia Narbonensis (Latin for "Gaul of Narbonne", from its chief settlement) was a Roman province located in what is now Languedoc and Provence, in Southern France. It was also known as Provincia Nostra ("Our Province"), because it was the ...

. When

Aquitania Gallia Aquitania ( , ), also known as Aquitaine or Aquitaine Gaul, was a province of the Roman Empire. It lies in present-day southwest France, where it gives its name to the modern region of Aquitaine. It was bordered by the provinces of Gallia ...

was conquered by Rome, Gaillac gained prosperity with its wine. However, the barbarian invasions annihilated the town and left nothing behind. It was only when the monks of Saint-Michel gained viticulture privileges from the Bishop of Albi, in 972, that the population stabilized and Gaillac started to become a town again. Their wines were at first sent to Bordeaux where they would be exported to England. The Abbey of St. Michel was constructed in the 10th century and rebuilt in 1271. In 1524 the abbey was secularized but the title of abbey retained. During the religious wars, the "Gaillacois" refused to change their religion and remained Catholics and were chased out of the town by Protestants. They took refuge at Castelnau-de-Montmiral. After the

St. Bartholomew's Day massacre The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre (french: Massacre de la Saint-Barthélemy) in 1572 was a targeted group of assassinations and a wave of Catholic mob violence, directed against the Huguenots (French Calvinist Protestants) during the French War ...

on 24 August 1572, in Paris, the Gaillacois massacred 74 out of the 90 Huguenots in the town. The abbey was once again rebuilt between 1572-1620. In the seventeenth century the Chateau of Foucaud was erected. It was from the town of Gaillac that

Louis-Philippe I Louis Philippe (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850) was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, and the penultimate monarch of France. As Louis Philippe, Duke of Chartres, he distinguished himself commanding troops during the Revolutionary War ...

addressed the words:

Nous chercherons à nous tenir dans un
juste milieu ''Juste milieu'' (meaning "middle way" or "happy medium") is a term that has been used to describe centrist political philosophies that try to find a balance between extremes, and artistic forms that try to find a middle ground between the traditi ...
, également éloigné des excès du pouvoir populaire et des abus du pouvoir royal.

Which may be translated: "We seek to keep ourselves in proper state, aloof from both the excesses of popular power and the abuses of royal power." This sentence would define the July Monarchy.

Population

Administration

The mayors of the town have been: *

Henri Yrissou Henri Yrissou (May 15, 1909 - June 21, 2009) was a French World War II veteran and politician. He served as a member of the National Assembly and as the mayor of Gaillac. Early life Henri Yrissou was born in Nîmes, France on May 15, 1909. During ...

1956-1977 * André Saux 1977-1983 * Jacques Dary 1983-1995 * Charles Pistre 1995-2005 * Michèle Rieux 2005–present

Transport

Gaillac station has rail connections to Toulouse, Aurillac, Albi and Rodez. Tessonnières station is on the line to Albi.

Sport

* UA Gaillac - Local rugby team.

Twin towns

* Caspe,

Notable people

Joseph Castagné Joseph-Antoine Castagné (Gaillac, Tarn, November 27, 1875 - January 19, 1958, Montpellier) was a French professor at the gymnase d'Orenbourg in Orenburg, Russia, an ethnographer and an expert on Central Asia. He wrote extensively about Russian Tur ...

- Ethnographer and expert on Central Asia.

References

{{Authority control Communes of Tarn (department) Languedoc