Saint-Arnac (; oc, Centernac) is a commune in the

Pyrénées-Orientales Pyrénées-Orientales (; ca, Pirineus Orientals ; oc, Pirenèus Orientals ; ), also known as Northern Catalonia, is a department of the region of Occitania, Southern France, adjacent to the northern Spanish frontier and the Mediterranean Sea. ...

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 France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

Geography

Saint-Arnac is in the

canton of La Vallée de l'Agly The canton of La Vallée de l'Agly is an administrative division of the Pyrénées-Orientales department, in southern France. It was created at the French canton reorganisation which came into effect in March 2015. Its seat is in Rivesaltes. It c ...

and in the

arrondissement of Perpignan An arrondissement (, , ) is any of various administrative divisions of France, Belgium, Haiti, certain other Francophone countries, as well as the Netherlands. Europe France The 101 French departments are divided into 342 ''arrondissements'' ...

Toponymy

;Attested forms The name of Saint-Arnac appears in 899 as ''villare Centernacho'', followed by ''Centernacum'' in the 12th century. But already in 1137, Ermengaud de So gives the name ''Sent Ernach'', which later becomes ''Sant Arnach'' or ''Sanctum Arnachum'', and then ''Saint-Arnac'' or ''Saint-Arnach'' in French. Jean Sagnes (dir.), Le pays catalan, t. 2, Pau, Société nouvelle d'éditions régionales, 1985 Lluís Basseda, Toponymie historique de Catalunya Nord, t. 1, Prades, Revista Terra Nostra, 1990 ;Etymology The original name, ''Centernach'', is probably that of a landowner, followed by the suffix ''-acum'', which may be either : * ''Centerinus'' (from ''Centenus'') ; * ''Cincturinus'' (from ''Cinctura'') ; * ''Centuriones'' (from

centurion A centurion (; la, centurio , . la, centuriones, label=none; grc-gre, κεντυρίων, kentyríōn, or ) was a position in the Roman army during classical antiquity, nominally the commander of a century (), a military unit of around 80 ...

). The mistake made in the 12th century by

homonymy In linguistics, homonyms are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation), or homophones (equivocal words, that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. Using this definition, ...

is a reference to a supposed ''saint Arnach'', who never existed, although ''Arnac'' used to be a common German name at the time (from ''arn'', eagle, followed by ''-acum'').

Population

References

Communes of Pyrénées-Orientales Fenouillèdes {{PyrénéesOrientales-geo-stub

Geography

Toponymy

Population

See also

References