Demographics and culture of the Pyrenees

Demographics and culture

Some Blonde d'Aquitaine on summer pasture near the Pic du Midi d'Ossau

The Pyrenean region possesses a varied ethnology, folklore and history: see Andorra; Aragon; Ariège; Basque Country; Béarn; Catalonia; Navarre; Roussillon. For their history, see also Almogavars, Marca Hispanica.

The principal languages spoken in the area are Spanish, French, Aragonese, Catalan (in Catalonia and Andorra), and Basque. Also spoken, to a lesser degree, is the Occitan language, consisting of he Gascon and Languedocien dialects in France and the Aranese dialect in the Aran Valley. https://all-andorra.com/pyrenees/

An important feature of rural life in the Pyrenees is 'transhumance', the moving of livestock from the farms in the valleys up to the higher grounds of the mountains for the summer.[15] In this way the farming communities could keep larger herds than the lowland farms could support on their own. The principal animals moved were cows and sheep, but historically most members of farming families also moved to the higher pastures along with their animals, so they also took with them pigs, horses[16] and chickens.[15] Transhumance thus took the form of a mass biannual migration, moving uphill in May or June[17] and returning to the farms in September or October. During the summer period, the families would live in basic stone cabins[15] in the high mountains.