Limousin
Limousin (; ) is a former administrative region of southwest-central France. Named after the old province of Limousin, the administrative region was founded in 1960. It comprised three departments: Corrèze, Creuse, and Haute-Vienne. On 1 Jan ...
: ''Cofolents'', ) is a commune in southwestern France. It is one of the two sub-prefectures of the
Confolens is located at the confluence of the Vienne and Goire rivers. This location is at the origin of its name.
Confolens is also at the point where the
Limousin
Limousin (; ) is a former administrative region of southwest-central France. Named after the old province of Limousin, the administrative region was founded in 1960. It comprised three departments: Corrèze, Creuse, and Haute-Vienne. On 1 Jan ...
regions meet, hence the name sometimes used to describe the area of "Charente Limousine".
History
Confolens was built around a fortress first mentioned in the eleventh century. It still has picturesque remnants of its medieval past, including city walls and several houses dating from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries. It also features a bridge first mentioned in the fourteenth century, and two churches from the 11th and 14th centuries respectively.
In the nineteenth century, Confolens developed itself as the administrative center for a considerable agriculture area, due to its role as sous-prefecture and the distance of all other major towns
Angoulême
Angoulême (; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''Engoulaeme''; ) is a small city in the southwestern French Departments of France, department of Charente, of which it is the Prefectures of France, prefecture.
Located on a plateau overlooking a meander of ...
(to the south-west),
Limoges
Limoges ( , , ; , locally ) is a city and Communes of France, commune, and the prefecture of the Haute-Vienne Departments of France, department in west-central France. It was the administrative capital of the former Limousin region. Situated o ...
and
Poitiers
Poitiers is a city on the river Clain in west-central France. It is a commune in France, commune, the capital of the Vienne (department), Vienne department and the historical center of Poitou, Poitou Province. In 2021, it had a population of 9 ...
are all about 70 kilometres away. It has several handsome nineteenth century administrative buildings, some of which were built by Paul Abadie, who was very active in the region.
There has been limited further urbanization in the twentieth century. The population of the town has aged, and the number of agriculture and industrial jobs have declined. British and Dutch have been acquiring property in and around the town, and now form a significant presence.
One of the most prominent people to have hailed from Confolens is Émile Roux, a physician and immunologist who was a close collaborator of
Louis Pasteur
Louis Pasteur (, ; 27 December 1822 – 28 September 1895) was a French chemist, pharmacist, and microbiologist renowned for his discoveries of the principles of vaccination, Fermentation, microbial fermentation, and pasteurization, the la ...
. The former Confolens high school was named for Roux.
Population
Events
Confolens is the home of the ''Festival de Folklore'', one of France's largest and best known folklore festivals, which takes place annually in August.
Twin towns
Confolens is twinned with:
*
Pitlochry
Pitlochry (; or ) is a town in the Perth and Kinross council area of Scotland, lying on the River Tummel. It is historically in the county of Perthshire, and has a population of 2,776, according to the 2011 census.Scotland's 2011 census. (n.p. ...
,
Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
,
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...