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Provence (Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of...

Provence (Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of southeastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. The traditional region of Provence comprises the départements of Var, Vaucluse, and Bouches-du-Rhône and parts of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and Alpes-Maritimes. The Romans, who conquered it in the 2nd Century B.C., called it Provincia Nostra ("our province") or simply Provincia ("the province"), and the name in French thus became Provence. Provence has been inhabited since prehistoric times. Paleolithic sites dating to 900,000 B.C. have been found along the Côte d'Azur in the interior country above Nice, at the Cave of Valloet (near Roquebrune) and a site dating to 600,000 B.C. at Terra Amata, in the Alpes-Maritimes. Remains of a settlement dating to between 27,000 and 19,000 B.C. were found by Henri Cosquer in 1991 at the Cosquer Cave, an underwater cave in a calanque on the coast near Marseille. The cave walls were decorated with drawings of bisons, seals, penguins, horses and outlines of human hands. A Neolithic site dating to about 6,000 B.C. was discovered