Île d'Yeu () or L'Île-d'Yeu, is an

island An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An isla ...

and commune just off the

Vendée Vendée (; br, Vande) is a department in the Pays de la Loire region in Western France, on the Atlantic coast. In 2019, it had a population of 685,442.

coast of western

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 ...

. The island's two harbors, Port-Joinville in the north and Port de la Meule to the south, in a rocky inlet of the southern granite coast, are famous for

tuna A tuna is a saltwater fish that belongs to the tribe Thunnini, a subgrouping of the Scombridae (mackerel) family. The Thunnini comprise 15 species across five genera, the sizes of which vary greatly, ranging from the bullet tuna (max length: ...

and

lobster Lobsters are a family (Nephropidae, synonym Homaridae) of marine crustaceans. They have long bodies with muscular tails and live in crevices or burrows on the sea floor. Three of their five pairs of legs have claws, including the first pair, ...

fishing, respectively. Administratively, the commune of L'Île-d'Yeu is part of the

Vendée Vendée (; br, Vande) is a department in the Pays de la Loire region in Western France, on the Atlantic coast. In 2019, it had a population of 685,442.

department and the

Pays de la Loire Pays de la Loire (; ; br, Broioù al Liger) is one of the 18 regions of France, in the west of the mainland. It was created in the 1950s to serve as a zone of influence for its capital, Nantes, one of a handful of "balancing metropolises" (). ...

region In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics ( physical geography), human impact characteristics ( human geography), and the interaction of humanity an ...

of France.

History

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several pa ...

markings in the native stone and an unusual concentration of

megalithic A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a prehistoric structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. There are over 35,000 in Europe alone, located widely from Sweden to the Mediterranean sea. The ...

dolmen A dolmen () or portal tomb is a type of single-chamber megalithic tomb, usually consisting of two or more upright megaliths supporting a large flat horizontal capstone or "table". Most date from the early Neolithic (40003000 BCE) and were some ...

s and

menhir A menhir (from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large human-made upright stone, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. They can be found ...

s attest to the island's early sanctity. Irish monks from

Bangor, County Down Bangor ( ; ) is a city and seaside resort in County Down, Northern Ireland, on the southern side of Belfast Lough. It is within the Belfast metropolitan area and is 13 miles (22 km) east of Belfast city centre, to which it is linke ...

, dedicated their monastery on the Île d'Yeu to Hilaire; Saint Amand from Poitou received early training there, but it was destroyed by

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

raiders in the ninth century. During the tenth century, monks from

Marmoutier :''See Marmoutier Abbey (Tours) for the former abbey in Tours.'' Marmoutier (; ) is a commune in the Bas-Rhin département in Grand Est in north-eastern France. The origin of the place is the former Marmoutier Abbey, of which the abbey church st ...

near Tours and monks of Saint-Cyprien at Poitiers built a new monastery and dedicated it to

Saint Stephen Stephen ( grc-gre, Στέφανος ''Stéphanos'', meaning "wreath, crown" and by extension "reward, honor, renown, fame", often given as a title rather than as a name; c. 5 – c. 34 AD) is traditionally venerated as the protomartyr or first ...

. The castle built on an islet linked to the coast by a bridge is first mentioned in 1356. Since the nineteenth century Île d'Yeu has attracted many artists. Jean Rigaud (1912–1999), official painter to the

French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in t ...

, had a house there, as did Maurice Boitel (1919–2007).

Jean Dufy Jean Dufy (March 12, 1888 – May 12, 1964) was a French painter of Parisian society, country scenes, circuses, horse races, theatrical productions, and orchestras. His work was exhibited in museums and galleries throughout his career. Ear ...

(1888-1964) made about twenty paintings of l'Ile d'Yeu during several summer stays between 1926 and 1930.

Philippe Pétain Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Pétain (24 April 1856 – 23 July 1951), commonly known as Philippe Pétain (, ) or Marshal Pétain (french: Maréchal Pétain), was a French general who attained the position of Marshal of France at the end of Worl ...

, the proclaimed hero of

Verdun Verdun (, , , ; official name before 1970 ''Verdun-sur-Meuse'') is a large city in the Meuse department in Grand Est, northeastern France. It is an arrondissement of the department. Verdun is the biggest city in Meuse, although the capital ...

during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

who later became the leader of France's wartime

collaborationist Wartime collaboration is cooperation with the enemy against one's country of citizenship in wartime, and in the words of historian Gerhard Hirschfeld, "is as old as war and the occupation of foreign territory". The term ''collaborator'' dates to ...

Vichy Vichy (, ; ; oc, Vichèi, link=no, ) is a city in the Allier department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of central France, in the historic province of Bourbonnais. It is a spa and resort town and in World War II was the capital of ...

régime, was sentenced to life imprisonment for

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...

on Île d'Yeu. He died in a private home in Port-Joinville in 1951, and is buried in the local cemetery (Cimetière communal de Port-Joinville).Paxton, Robert O. (1982). ''Vichy France: Old Guard and New Order, 1940–1944'', pp. 36–37. Columbia University Press. . The poet Marc-Adolphe Guégan, an early French exponent of

haiku is a type of short form poetry originally from Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases that contain a '' kireji'', or "cutting word", 17 '' on'' (phonetic units similar to syllables) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern, and a '' kigo'', or ...

, lived on the island until his death in 1959. The island's seaweeds have been the subject of studies by the French marine biologist

Françoise Ardré Françoise Ardré (1931–2010) was a French phycologist and marine scientist, honoured as the namesake of the red alga known as ''Pterosiphonia ardreana''. Christine A. Maggs & Max H. Hommersand (1993) ''Seaweeds of the British Isles: a collabor ...

. The children's author

Ludwig Bemelmans Ludwig Bemelmans (April 27, 1898 – October 1, 1962) was an Austrian-American writer and illustrator of children's books and adult novels. He is known best for the ''Madeline'' picture books. Six were published, the first in 1939. Early life ...

, who summered on the island, took inspiration from a hospital stay after a bicycle crash for his first ''Madeline'' book, published in 1939. A two year pilot program, called Harmon’Yeu, was initiated in the Spring of 2020 to interconnect 23 houses in the Ker Pissot neighborhood and surrounding areas with a

microgrid A microgrid is a local electrical grid with defined electrical boundaries, acting as a single and controllable entity. It is able to operate in grid-connected and in island mode.

that was automated as a

smart grid A smart grid is an electrical grid which includes a variety of operation and energy measures including: *Advanced metering infrastructure (of which smart meters are a generic name for any utility side device even if it is more capable e.g. a f ...

with software from Engie. Sixty-four solar panels with a peak capacity of 23.7 kW were installed on five houses and a battery with a storage capacity of 15 kWh was installed on one house. Six houses store excess solar energy in their hot water heaters. A dynamic system apportions the energy provided by the solar panels and stored in the battery and hot water heaters to the system of 23 houses. The smart grid software dynamically updates energy supply and demand in 5 minute intervals, deciding whether to pull energy from the battery or from the panels and when to store it in the hot water heaters. This pilot program was the first such project in France.

Transport

The island is reached by ferry from Fromentine or

Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie () is a commune in the Vendée department, region of Pays de la Loire, western France. It is situated on the Côte de Lumière. The community originated in 1967 from the unification of two communities on either side ...

. Air transportation is available at Île d'Yeu Aerodrome , with commercial service from Nantes Airport.

Climate

Île d'Yeu has an

oceanic climate An oceanic climate, also known as a marine climate, is the humid temperate climate sub-type in Köppen classification ''Cfb'', typical of west coasts in higher middle latitudes of continents, generally featuring cool summers and mild winters ...

( Köppen: ''Cfb'') with mild weather year-round and significantly more precipitation in winter than in summer.

Gallery

Ile yeu port de la meule.JPG, Le Port de la Meule (Stack Harbor) Ile yeu pointe des corbeaux.JPG, La pointe des Corbeaux (Crows' Edge) Ile-d-yeu-plage-des-sapins.jpg, La plage des Sapins (Fir Tree Beach) Ile-d-yeu-vieux-chateau.jpg, Beach with the Old Castle in the back Ile-d-yeu-port des broches.jpg, La pointe du But Ile-d-yeu-bateaux-peche-port-joinville.jpg, Port-Joinville

History

Transport

Climate

Gallery

See also