The Pyrenees: information and main facts

The Pyrenees: information and main facts

The Pyrenees (endonyms: els Pirineus or el Pirineu in Catalan, Pyrénées in French, Pirenèus in Occitan, Pireneu in Aragonese, Pirinioak in Basque, Pirineos in Spanish) are a set of ranges (forming one mountain range) located at the north of the Iberian Peninsula and crossing the entire length of the isthmus that unites the Peninsula to the rest of Europe.

They extend from the Mediterranean Sea (Cap de Creus) on the east, to the Cantabrian Sea (Bay of Biscay) on the west; to the south, there is the depression of the Ebro and to the north the one of the Garonne.

The Pyrenees occupy the northern part of Catalonia, Aragon, Navarre and Basque Country; the southern parts of the North Basque Country (France) and Occitania (Bearn, Gascunya, and Languedoc); the west and south parts of northern Catalonia (France); and the whole of Andorra. The border between France and Spain mostly follows the Pyrenees. The Basque Country and Catalonia are located respectively at the west and east end of the mountain range.

The range is about 425 km long and has a width that generally does not exceed 100 km, with a total area of 19,000 km². The five highest peaks in the mountain chain are the Aneto (3,404 m), the Pocets peak (3,375 m), the Monte Perdido (3,355 m) (cat. Mont Perdut), the Punta d’Astorg (3,355 m) and the Pic Maldito (3,350 m ).

Despite its unity as a massif, it is often convenient to divide the range into differentiated areas depending on the context. According to the slope: the northern or the southern slopes of the Pyrenees; to the territory, the Catalan, Occitan, Aragonese and Basque Pyrenees; or even region: Pirineu d’Aude, Pirineu de Girona, Pirineu de Navarra. On the other hand, it can be divided in terms of altitude: the Upper and Lower Pyrenees, the Pre-Pyrenees (the lowest mountain ranges around the massif itself), or more proportionally the eastern Pyrenees, the central Pyrenees and the western Pyrenees. Finally, it is divided into climate zones of the Atlantic Pyrenees and the Mediterranean Pyrenees.

Etymology

There are many possible etymologies for the name of these mountains:

● The term “Pirineus” comes from a personage of Greek mythology, Pirena (Πυρήνη). Heràcles built a tomb for Pirena giving her name to the mountain range. The word “Pirineus” was already known in ancient Greek: the term Πυρηναῖα (Pirēnaîa) appears in the texts of Plutarch.

● The Pyrenees, however, could also come from poranaia, pora (huge) and naga (mountain), a word from the ancient language of the people that inhabited the north of the massif before the Celts.

● A text by Diodor of Sicily (1st century BC) says that, long ago, the Pyrenees were covered by forests that got burnt by pastors. The earth itself burnt – thus giving it the name Pirineu, from ancient Greek πῦρ pîr, meaning fire.

● According to another theory, it is an Iberian or Basque ancestral toponym. In this language, the mountain range is called Ilene os (“piles of the moon”) as “Ilene” means the moon.

Geography

In physical geography, the Pyrenees form a fairly straight-line quite narrow mountain range, of a total length of 430 kilometres from Cap de Creus, in the Mediterranean, to the Gulf of Gascony, in the Atlantic. The western boundary is difficult to determine accurately because the Pyrenees blend progressively with the Basque mountains between Álava and Biscay, which to the west connect with the Cantabrian Mountains, thus creating a Pyrenean-Cantabrian axis of 1,000 km. The simplest, and most popularly accepted geographical definition, refers to its “isthmus” nature: a mountain range between the Mediterranean and the Gulf of Gascony, which separates the Iberian Peninsula from the rest of the European continent.

The Pyrenean valleys are typically oriented from north to south, except for the maritime extremities and some remarkable valleys such as Ordesa, Cerdanya and Aragón. This explains the low accessibility between the different valleys (the Jaca-Pamplona and Puigcerdà-la Seu d’Urgell axes are two exceptions). In addition, the highest peaks are mixed without any major depression that separates them, which explains why there are so few usable passes between the two sides.

The border between Spain and France, as a rule, follows the line of the highest peaks, with the notable exception of the Aran valley, which belongs to Spain but is located on the northern slope. Another exception is the great plain of La Cerdanya, which is on the southern slope but is divided between the two states nevertheless (see: Treaty of the Pyrenees). In order to set an approximate width of the massif, it can be said that the Pyrenean foothills and pre-Pyrenees blend into the basins of the Ebro to the south and the Garona and Aude to the north.

Geology

The Pyrenees is a variscan orogeny massif (of the paleozoic/primary era) practically swept out during the Mesozoic (secondary era) and re-elevated during the Tertiary era (Alpine orogeny), as part of the great Alpine-Himalayan folding.

In the axial Pyrenees, there are crystalline materials of the primary period (granites and metamorphic rock), while the Pre-Pyrenees is made up of sedimentary materials from secondary and tertiary periods (limestone, conglomerate, clay, marl, sandstone).

The most pronounced geological features are: the asymmetry of the slopes in the transverse direction, meaning that its unevenness is much more pronounced on the north side than on the south; and the asymmetry in the longitudinal direction: the massif progressively descends to the Bay of Biscay and more abruptly to the Mediterranean.

From the structural point of view, the Pyrenees are clearly different from the Alps, while in the second one the thrust sheets played a decisive role, the Pyrenees can be classified as a mountain range of autochthonous folds.

The sediments of the genesis of the Pyrenees were deposited in the coastal basins during the Paleozoic (primary era) and the Mesozoic era (secondary era). Then, in the Early Cretaceous (150 – 100 Ma), under the effect of an oceanic opening, the Bay of Biscay fanned out, pushing Iberia against the European continent and taking large layers of these sediments ensue. The pressure and lifting of the earth’s crust first affected the eastern part to then progressively extend to the entire chain, a process that culminated in the Eocene at the beginning of Cenozoic (tertiary era).

The eastern part of the Pyrenees is mostly made up of crustal rocks (granites and gneiss), while in the western part the granite peaks are flanked by layers of limestone. The massive and little worn character of the mountain range is a consequence of this predominance of crustal rocks, which hinders erosion and the creation of glaciers.

Highest Summits and altitudes

The culminating point of the Pyrenees is the Aneto peak with 3,404 meters, located between the Ribagorça and the Aran Valley. Almost all of the peaks with the elevation exceeding 3,000 m are in the central Pyrenees. In the French region of Midi-Pyrenees, in Catalonia and in Aragon. In total there are 129 main summits and 83 sub-summits above the mythical bar of the three thousand meters, divided into eleven zones.

It should be mentioned that this symbolic boundary that divides the mountains into high (more than three thousand meters) and middle (less than three thousand) is an invention of the 19th century when the French Revolution institutionalized the metric system (before the toise was the unit of measure in France).

Some of the most important peaks of the Pyrenees:

● Aneto (3,403.5 m) in Ribagorça, the highest in the range.

● The Pocets peak (3,375 m) in La Ribagorça.

● El Monte Perdido (3,348.2 m) in Aragon.

● The Vinhamala (3,298 m) in Gascony.

● The Pica d’Estats (3,143.1m), between Pallars Sobirà and País de Foix, is the highest mountain in Catalonia.

● The Comapedrosa (2,942 m), the highest altitude of Andorra.

● El Carlit (2,921 m), in the Alta Cerdanya.

● El Puigmal (2,910 m), in Ripollès.

● The Collarada (2,886 m), in Aragon.

● Pic du Midi d’Ossau (2,885 m).

● El Migdia de Bigorra (2,877 m).

● El Montardo (2,833.8 m), in the Vall d’Aran.

● The Canigou (2,784 m), in the Conflent, symbolic mountain of Catalonia.

● The two peaks of Els Encantats (2,734.3 and 2,748.1 m), in Pallars Sobirà.

● The Great Gabizos (2,692 m).

● The Pedraforca (2,506.1 m), in Berguedà.

● The pic d’Anie, divided between Occitania, Aragon and the Basque Country (2,504 m).

However, some important mountains of the massif do not reach such high altitudes: the Bugarachla peak, in the Corbera range( Northern Pre-Pyrenean), which marks the border of Northern Catalonia and Occitania, is 1,230 m and the Larrun peak, a magical mountain for the Basques, is 905 m.

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