Orne (French pronunciation: [ɔʁn] ; Norman : Ôrne or Orne) is a département in the northwest of France, named after the river Orne. It had a population of 279,942 in 2019. [3]
Orne is one of the original 83 départements created during the French Revolution, on 4 March 1790. It was created from parts of the former provinces of Normandy and Perche. It is the birthplace of Charlotte Corday, Girondist and the assassin of Jean-Paul Marat.
Orne is in the region of Normandy neighbouring Eure, Eure-et-Loir, Sarthe, Manche, Mayenne, and Calvados. It is the only department of Normandy not to border the English Channel.
The largest town by a considerable margin is the prefecture, Alençon, which is an administrative and commercial centre for what is still an overwhelmingly rural department. There are no large industrial centres, and agriculture remains the economic focus.
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Sources: [4] [5] |
The inhabitants of the department are called Ornais.
The recorded population level peaked at 443,688 in 1836. Declining farm incomes and the lure of better prospects in the overseas empire led to a sustained reduction in population levels in many rural departments. By the time of the 1936 census, the recorded population stood at just 269,331. Once motor car ownership started to surge in the 1960s, employment opportunities became less restricted and by 1982, the population level had recovered a little to 295,000, after which it slowly decreased.
The most populous commune is Alençon, the prefecture. As of 2019, there are 5 communes with more than 5,000 inhabitants: [3]
Commune | Population (2019) |
---|---|
Alençon | 25,870 |
Flers | 14,762 |
Argentan | 13,395 |
L'Aigle | 7,961 |
La Ferté Macé | 5,186 |
The president of the Departmental Council is Christophe de Balorre, elected in 2017.
Election | Winning Candidate | Party | % | 2nd Place Candidate | Party | % | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2022 [6] | Emmanuel Macron | LREM | 55.12 | Marine Le Pen | RN | 44.88 | |
2017 | Emmanuel Macron | LREM | 61.64 | Marine Le Pen | FN | 38.36 | |
2012 | Nicolas Sarkozy | UMP | 52.89 | François Hollande | PS | 47.11 | |
2007 | Nicolas Sarkozy | UMP | 57.66 | Ségolène Royal | PS | 42.34 | |
2002 [7] | Jacques Chirac | RPR | 81.30 | Jean-Marie Le Pen | FN | 18.70 |
Constituency | Member [8] | Party | |
---|---|---|---|
Orne's 1st constituency | Joaquim Pueyo | Socialist Party | |
Orne's 2nd constituency | Véronique Louwagie | The Republicans | |
Orne's 3rd constituency | Jérôme Nury | The Republicans |
Alençon is the chief town of the Orne department.
Camembert, the village where Camembert cheese is made, is located in Orne.
The local dialect is known as Augeron .
Loire is a landlocked département in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of France occupying the river Loire's upper reaches. Its prefecture is Saint-Étienne. It had a population of 765,634 in 2019.
Nord is a département in Hauts-de-France region, France bordering Belgium. It was created from the western halves of the historical counties of Flanders and Hainaut, and the Bishopric of Cambrai. The modern coat of arms was inherited from the County of Flanders.
Calvados is a department in the Normandy region in northwestern France. It takes its name from a cluster of rocks off the Normandy coast. In 2019, it had a population of 694,905.
Seine-Maritime is a department of France in the Normandy region of northern France. It is situated on the northern coast of France, at the mouth of the Seine, and includes the cities of Rouen and Le Havre. Until 1955 it was named Seine-Inférieure. It had a population of 1,255,633 in 2019.
Marne is a department in the Grand Est region of France. It is named after the river Marne which flows through it. The prefecture (capital) of Marne is Châlons-en-Champagne. The subprefectures are Épernay, Reims, and Vitry-le-François. It had a population of 566,855 in 2019.
Haute-Marne is a department in the Grand Est region of Northeastern France. Named after the river Marne, its prefecture is Chaumont. In 2019, it had a population of 172,512.
Yvelines is a department in the western part of the Île-de-France region in Northern France. In 2019, it had a population of 1,448,207. Its prefecture is Versailles, home to the Palace of Versailles, the principal residence of the King of France from 1682 until 1789, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979. Yvelines' subprefectures are Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Mantes-la-Jolie and Rambouillet.
Manche is a coastal French département in Normandy on the English Channel, which is known as La Manche, literally "the sleeve", in French. Manche is bordered by Ille-et-Vilaine and Mayenne to the south, Orne and Calvados to the east, the English Channel to the west and north and by sharing maritime borders with the Crown Dependencies of Bailiwick of Jersey and Bailiwick of Guernsey of the United Kingdom to the west. It had a population of 495,045 in 2019.
Eure is a department in Normandy in Northwestern France, named after the river Eure. Its prefecture is Évreux. In 2021, Eure had a population of 598,934.
Eure-et-Loir is a French department, named after the Eure and Loir rivers. It is located in the region of Centre-Val de Loire. In 2019, Eure-et-Loir had a population of 431,575.
Meurthe-et-Moselle is a département in the Grand Est region of France, named after the rivers Meurthe and Moselle. Its prefecture and largest city is Nancy and it borders the departments of Meuse to the west, Vosges to the south, Moselle and Bas-Rhin and it borders the Belgian province of Luxembourg and the country of Luxembourg by the canton of Esch-sur-Alzette to the north. It had a population of 733,760 in 2019.
Mayenne is a landlocked department in northwest France named after the river Mayenne. Mayenne is part of the administrative region of Pays de la Loire and is surrounded by the departments of Manche, Orne, Sarthe, Maine-et-Loire, and Ille-et-Vilaine.
Oise is a department in the north of France. It is named after the river Oise. Inhabitants of the department are called Oisiens or Isariens, after the Latin name for the river, Isara. It had a population of 829,419 in 2019.
Sarthe is a department of the French region of Pays de la Loire, and the province of Maine, situated in the Grand-Ouest of the country. It is named after the river Sarthe, which flows from east of Le Mans to just north of Angers. It had a population of 566,412 in 2019.
Essonne is a department in the southern part of the Île-de-France region in Northern France. It is named after the river Essonne. In 2019, it had a population of 1,301,659, across 194 communes.
Val-de-Marne is a department of France located in the Île-de-France region. Named after the river Marne, it is situated in the Grand Paris metropolis to the southeast of the City of Paris. In 2019, Val-de-Marne had a population of 1,407,124.
Val-d'Oise is a department in the Île-de-France region, Northern France. It was created in 1968 following the split of the Seine-et-Oise department. In 2019, Val-d'Oise had a population of 1,249,674.
Normandy is the northwesternmost of the eighteen regions of France, roughly coextensive with the historical Duchy of Normandy.
The 1st constituency of the Orne is a French legislative constituency in the Orne département. Like the other 576 French constituencies, it elects one MP using a two round electoral system.
The Communauté de communes d'Argentan Intercom is a federation of municipalities in the Orne département and in the Normandy région of France. Its seat is Argentan. Its area is 715.1 km2, and its population in 2019 was 33,409. It covers some of the Communes that make up the area known as Suisse Normande.