Villages and hamlets of France

Aix-en-Diois

Aix-en-Diois (Occitan Ais de Diés), a former commune in the Drôme, France, named from Latin aqua for its springs; Roman baths, a medieval castle, merged into Solaure-en-Diois in 2016.

Ambrault

Ambrault is a commune in the Indre department in the Centre-Val de Loire region of central France, southwest of Issoudun, known for its oolitic limestone quarries at the hamlet of Boisramier.

Athies, a village in the Somme department of northern France between Amiens and Saint-Quentin, known for a large Gallo-Roman villa at Bois Saint-Jean and a 6th-century Merovingian royal villa linked to Queen Radegonde.

Aumagne

Aumagne, a commune of 722 inhabitants in Charente-Maritime, France (Vals de Saintonge), named after the Alamans, with a Roman castrum, a Neolithic polissoir, and an art nouveau winter garden.

Aussières

Aussières, a lieu-dit of Narbonne (Aude, Occitanie), is the Domaine/Château d'Aussières, a 559-hectare Corbières wine estate in the Fontfroide massif owned by Domaines Barons de Rothschild (Lafite) since 1999, organic since 2022.

Bramans

Bramans, former commune in Haute-Maurienne, Savoie, France (merged into Val-Cenis 2017), on the Arc river near Italy; known for the Roman road role and the medieval Colombière copper-lead-iron mine with 11th-century timbering.

Châteauneuf-du-Pape

Châteauneuf-du-Pape: Vaucluse village and French wine appellation, the first AOC (1936), 3,150 ha over five communes near Avignon, 13 grape varieties, galets roulés terroir, papal history under Jean XXII.

Chevigny

Chevigny names several French villages, mostly in Burgundy: a Yonne hamlet with a Roman quarry that supplied the colossal Apollo of Entrains, the Château de Chevigny at Millery, communes in the Jura and Côte-d'Or, and an Alberta coal mine.

Cocurès

Cocurès is a village in Lozère, southern France, on the right bank of the Tarn about two kilometers east of Florac, merged into Bédouès-Cocurès in 2016.

Conques

Conques, Aveyron village in southern France around the Romanesque Abbey Church of Sainte-Foy; relics transferred from Agen c. 866 made it a major Compostela pilgrimage halt; UNESCO-listed since 1998.

Cucuron

Cucuron is a village in the Vaucluse department of Provence, southern France, at the southern foot of the Luberon, known for a Gallo-Roman mausoleum excavated in 1970.

Dambach

Dambach: an Alsatian commune in Bas-Rhin with the castles Schoeneck, Wineck, and Hohenfels and 14th-century walls, and a Bavarian village with a Roman Raetian Limes fort destroyed in 254 AD.

Epiais-Rhus

Épiais-Rhus, a Val-d'Oise commune north of Pontoise, France, known for its Gallo-Roman archaeological site (Les Terres Noires) with theatre, baths, temple, and forum, classified monument historique in 1983, plus the 16th-century Notre-Dame church.

Ericeira

Ericeira is a fishing town and parish in Mafra municipality, Portugal, about 40 km from Lisbon. Dedicated in 2011 as the world's second World Surfing Reserve and first in Europe, with breaks like Ribeira d'Ilhas and Coxos.

Étretat

Étretat, Seine-Maritime commune on Normandy's Alabaster Coast, famed for chalk cliffs, the Aiguille and natural arches; a 19th-century resort turned overtourism hotspot with about 1.5 million annual visitors.

Èze

Èze (INSEE 06059) is an Alpes-Maritimes commune on the Côte d'Azur between Nice and Monaco, with a medieval hilltop village at 429 m, the Jardin Exotique, the Chemin de Nietzsche, and about 2,144 inhabitants (2023).

Fleury

Fleury: name of several French communes and places (Aisne, Moselle, Essonne, Fleury-sur-Orne, Fleury-devant-Douaumont) and the abbey of Fleury, from Gallo-Roman Floriacus with the Celtic suffix -acum.

Fouillouse

Fouillouse is the name of several places in France: a village at about 1,900 m in the Ubaye valley of the Hautes-Alpes, a commune in the Loire near Saint-Étienne, and a commune in Lozère.

Gamaches-en-Vexin

Gamaches-en-Vexin, a commune in the Eure (Normandy, INSEE 27276), Vexin normand; 295 inhabitants in 2023; Gallo-Roman theater and villa traces, a 12th-century castle taken by Richard the Lionheart in 1195, and an 1891 Notre-Dame church.

Génolhac

Génolhac, Gard commune in the Cévennes at the foot of Mont Lozère; medieval village on the Régordane road (GR700), charter of 1228, Dominicans from 1302, 1880 lead-silver mining concession, tannin factory until 1964.

Giverny

Giverny, a village in Normandy's Eure department (75 km from Paris), is Claude Monet's home from 1883 to 1926; his house, Clos Normand, and water lily garden draw about 775,000 annual visitors, making it one of France's most visited villages.

Gordes

Gordes, Vaucluse hilltop village in Provence, France, among Les Plus Beaux Villages de France; known for its 1031 castle, Sénanque Abbey (1148), and the Village des Bories dry-stone huts.

La Roche-Guyon

La Roche-Guyon is a village of about 400 inhabitants in Val-d'Oise, Île-de-France, on a meander of the Seine beneath chalk cliffs. It is the only Plus Beaux Villages de France village in Île-de-France, with a troglodytic castle, 12th-century donjon, and Rohan chapel bas-reliefs.