View allAll Photos Tagged PlaneTrees
One example of the many beautiful plane trees on Ikaria. Most people who travel along the west coast on the road between Nas and Karkinagri will pass this large tree. Some will stop and take a rest in the shadow of the tree. Enjoy the dancing of the leaves in the wind and the always changing light and shadow patterns. Others leave their car or motorbike under this tree and go for a hike or a swim. Ikaria island, Greece, July 2018. (PMZ2895)
Ripe Plane Tree Fruit on the Banks of the Warta (Platanus acerifolia, Platanus hispanica, London plane, hybrid plane; Platan klonolistny). The London plane develops green, spiky fruits which develop in clusters (olive green to grey bark with a camouflage-style pattern, no woodland tree). The American sycamore and Oriental plane hybrid discovered in the 17th century then widely planted in the 18th, can grow to 35m and can live for several hundred years.
June 16 is Bloomsday, commemorating James Joyce's novel, 'Ulysses'. All of the narrative of the novel takes place on June 16, 1904, and today is celebrated annually around the world, usually with readings from that marvellous book, first published in 1922. Many call it the greatest novel ever written.
We commemorated Bloomsday in Bellingen at the estimable bellaBOOKafe at 7 Church St. I read the following selection:
In Inisfail the fair there lies a land, the land of holy Michan. There rises a watchtower beheld of men afar. There sleep the mighty dead as in life they slept, warriors and princes of high renown. A pleasant land it is in sooth of murmuring waters, fishful streams where sport the gurnard, the plaice, the roach, the halibut, the gibbed haddock, the grilse, the dab, the brill, the flounder, the pollock, the mixed coarse fish generally and other denizens of the aqueous kingdom too numerous to be enumerated. In the mild breezes of the west and of the east the lofty trees wave in different directions their firstclass foliage, the wafty sycamore, the Lebanonian cedar, the exalted planetree, the eugenic eucalyptus and other ornaments of the arboreal world with which that region is thoroughly well supplied. Lovely maidens sit in close proximity to the roots of the lovely trees singing the most lovely songs while they play with all kinds of lovely objects as for example golden ingots, silvery fishes, crans of herrings, drafts of eels, codlings, creels of fingerlings, purple seagems and playful insects. And heroes voyage from afar to woo them, from Eblana to Slievemargy, the peerless princes of unfettered Munster and of Connacht the just and of smooth sleek Leinster and of Cruahan's land and of Armagh the splendid and of the noble district of Boyle, princes, the sons of kings.
And there rises a shining palace whose crystal glittering roof is seen by mariners who traverse the extensive sea in barks built expressly for that purpose, and thither come all herds and fatlings and firstfruits of that land for O'Connell Fitzsimon takes toll of them, a chieftain descended from chieftains. Thither the extremely large wains bring foison of the fields, flaskets of cauliflowers, floats of spinach, pineapple chunks, Rangoon beans, strikes of tomatoes, drums of figs, drills of Swedes, spherical potatoes and tallies of iridescent kale, York and Savoy, and trays of onions, pearls of the earth, and punnets of mushrooms and custard marrows and fat vetches and bere and rape and red green yellow brown russet sweet big bitter ripe pomellated apples and chips of strawberries and sieves of gooseberries, pulpy and pelurious, and strawberries fit for princes and raspberries from their canes.
I dare him, says he, and I doubledare him. Come out here, Geraghty, you notorious bloody hill and dale robber!
And by that way wend the herds innumerable of bellwethers and flushed ewes and shearling rams and lambs and stubble geese and medium steers and roaring mares and polled calves and longwoods and storesheep and Cuffe's prime springers and culls and sowpigs and baconhogs and the various different varieties of highly distinguished swine and Angus heifers and polly bullocks of immaculate pedigree together with prime premiated milchcows and beeves: and there is ever heard a trampling, cackling, roaring, lowing, bleating, bellowing, rumbling, grunting,
champing, chewing, of sheep and pigs and heavyhooved kine from pasturelands of Lusk and Rush and Carrickmines and from the streamy vales of Thomond, from the M'Gillicuddy's reeks the inaccessible and lordly Shannon the unfathomable, and from the gentle declivities of the place of the race of Kiar, their udders distended with superabundance of milk and butts of butter and rennets of cheese and farmer's firkins and targets of lamb and crannocks of corn and oblong eggs in great hundreds, various in size, the agate with this dun.
So we turned into Barney Kiernan's and there, sure enough, was the citizen up in the corner having a great confab with himself and that bloody mangy mongrel, Garryowen, and he waiting for what the sky would drop in the way of drink.
--There he is, says I, in his gloryhole, with his cruiskeen lawn and his load of papers, working for the cause.
The bloody mongrel let a grouse out of him would give you the creeps. Be a corporal work of mercy if someone would take the life of that bloody dog. I'm told for a fact he ate a good part of the breeches off a constabulary man in Santry that came round one time with a blue paper about a licence.
--Stand and deliver, says he.
--That's all right, citizen, says Joe. Friends here.
--Pass, friends, says he.
Then he rubs his hand in his eye and says he:
--What's your opinion of the times?
Doing the rapparee and Rory of the hill. But, begob, Joe was equal to the occasion.
--I think the markets are on a rise, says he, sliding his hand down his fork.
So begob the citizen claps his paw on his knee and he says:
--Foreign wars is the cause of it.
And says Joe, sticking his thumb in his pocket:
--It's the Russians wish to tyrannise.
--Arrah, give over your bloody codding, Joe, says I. I've a thirst on me I wouldn't sell for half a crown.
--Give it a name, citizen, says Joe.
--Wine of the country, says he.
--What's yours? says Joe.
--Ditto MacAnaspey, says I.
--Three pints, Terry, says Joe. And how's the old heart, citizen? says he.
--Never better, a chara, says he. What Garry? Are we going to win? Eh?
And with that he took the bloody old towser by the scruff of the neck and, by Jesus, he near throttled him.
Down
down
down
Red
yellow
brown
Autumn leaves tumble down,
Autumn leaves crumble down,
Autumn leaves bumble down,
Flaking and shaking,
Tumbledown leaves.
Skittery
Flittery
Rustle by
Hustle by
Crackle and crunch
In a snappety bunch.
Run and catch
Run and catch
Butterfly leaves
Sailboat leaves
Windstorm leaves.
Can you catch them?
Swoop,
Scoop,
Pile them up
In a stompy pile and
Jump
Jump
JUMP!
by Eve Merriam
This photo was taken with a mobile phone camera by our friend, Adrian J. - He told me to go ahead and send him the link to read the comments….
I do what I'm told and hope he's got something to read… - Thank you for your comments!
Personally, I love this photo, the colours, the framing, the lake in the background… :-)
© All rights reserved
Allan McCollum. Allégories, sur l’Esplanade Charles de Gaulle, Montpellier, Hérault, Languedoc, France
This shot of the sun through a cross screen filter was all that was usable from this experimental roll of Ektar 25. The film speed had dropped to 1 or 2 with some crazy color shifts, I wonder how it was stored.
Panorama shot of the the Circus looking north with Brock Street on the left and Bennett street on the right.
Not perfect but also not bad for a handheld attempt. Processed in Lightroom 6
Prints and Greeting Cards: joana-kruse.artistwebsites.com/?tab=artworkgalleries
Arizona Sycamore Tree.
Platanus wrightii, Planetree Family ( Platanaceae ), Arizona Sycamore Tree. Also called: Plane Tree, Planetree, in Spanish it is called Alamo.
delange.org/SycamoreArizona/SycamoreArizona.htm
We wish to thank Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia for some of the information on this page. We share images and information with Wikipedia.
The Arizona Sycamore is a common tree of central Arizona's transition zone in the Mogollon Rim–White Mountains, and an extension of the range east into southwest New Mexico. In Arizona the range extends south towards northern Sonora. The range in southeast Arizona-northeast Sonora is a northeasterly part of the Sonoran Desert, and is at the northern region of the Sierra Madre Occidental cordillera.
Arizona Sycamore is found in the riparian areas of the Madrean Sky Islands, mountain sky islands in southeastern Arizona, in the extreme southwest, bootheel region of New Mexico, and northeast Sonora, as well as within the extreme northwest of Chihuahua. The range of the species is more prevalent west of the Madrean Sky Islands region, still in the central and northeast Sonoran Desert, an area around the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument at the Arizona-Sonora border, with the species range being slightly greater in Sonora in the Occidentals, or its western foothills.
Will grow at 0 feet elevation, but normally found over 2,000 feet to 6,000 feet in the wild. Used in landscaping often at about 1,200 feet.
Quick Notes:
Height: Usually 50 - 65 feet, with equal or slightly less spread. Can reach 80 feet in some areas.
Trunk: Up To About 3 Feet Thick.
Bark: The bark is white with brownish-gray sploches.
Flowers: Monoecious; imperfect, male flowers are on green balls about 1/2 inch in diameter. Female flowers are on green balls about 1 - 1 1/2 inches in diameter . Male and female flowers grow same tree.
Flowering Time: Southern Arizona, March - April. Phoenix Area, April - May.
Fruit & Seeds: Each brown round ball is composed of numerous tiny, tufted seeds (achenes); the balls disintegrate over the winter, dispersing the seeds with the wind.
Trunk: Up To About 1 1/2 Foot Thick. A single trunk with arm-like branches and old dry leaves left in place.
Leaves: The leaves are alternate, simple, deciduous, 6 to 9 inches long, they have 3 to 5 pointed lobes, swollen petiole base, green above, pale green below.
Found: Native to the United States; (AZ, NM). Also native to northern Mexico in northern Sonora, northwestern Chihuahua.
Hardiness:
USDA Zone 4a: to -34.4 °C (-30 °F)
USDA Zone 4b: to -31.6 °C (-25 °F)
USDA Zone 5a: to -28.8 °C (-20 °F)
USDA Zone 5b: to -26.1 °C (-15 °F)
USDA Zone 6a: to -23.3 °C (-10 °F)
USDA Zone 6b: to -20.5 °C (-5 °F)
USDA Zone 7a: to -17.7 °C (0 °F)
USDA Zone 7b: to -14.9 °C (5 °F)
USDA Zone 8a: to -12.2 °C (10 °F)
USDA Zone 8b: to -9.4 °C (15 °F)
USDA Zone 9a: to -6.6 °C (20 °F)
USDA Zone 9b: to -3.8 °C (25 °F)
USDA Zone 10a: to -1.1 °C (30 °F)
USDA Zone 10b: to 1.7 °C (35 °F)
USDA Zone 11: above 4.5 °C (40 °F)
Soil pH requirements:
5.6 to 6.0 (acidic)
6.1 to 6.5 (mildly acidic)
6.6 to 7.5 (neutral)
7.6 to 7.8 (mildly alkaline)
7.9 to 8.5 (alkaline)
Sun Exposure:
Full Sun
Elevation: 0 - 6,000 Feet. Normally found over 2,000 feet in the wild.
Habitat: A riparian area tree, which gives an aromatic smell to creek and river habitats. Very often found growing in large groves. Often with cottonwood trees.
Miscellaneous: Maintenance: high; leaf drop in the fall. Needs water. Not pool friendly.
IMG_4697
CANON EOS 5D Mark III + EF 85mm f/1.2L II USM | Shot at ISO320, F/2.0, 1/640s.
Press " L " to view this picture in Large format on dark background.
This is my "bark alphabet" that I collect from 2011 from the bark of the plane trees of my city. It cost to me hundreds of hours of work, and it's still work in progress. The shapes are all naturals, not from human origin, and I have not photoshopped or retouched any of them. I collect many alphabets (in the clouds, in the sea foam, etc), but this is my favourite. I have coined the word "dendrotypography" for the study of these letters.
At this link you can download the whole alphabet in ZIP format (7MB): bazardelbizzarro.deviantart.com/art/Bark-Alphabet-04-21-2...
--
questo è il mio alfabeto di corteccia, che raccolgo dal 2011 dalle cortecce dei platani della mia città. Mi è costato centinaia di ore di lavoro, e continuo sempre a migliorarlo. Le forme sono assolutamente naturali e non di origine umana, e non ho mai ritoccato in alcun modo le immagini. Raccolgo diversi alfabeti (nelle nuvole, nella schiuma di mare, eccetera), ma questo è il mio preferito. Ho coniato il termine "dendrotipografia" per indicare lo studio di queste lettere.
A questo link potete scaricare l'intero alfabeto in formato ZIP (7MB): bazardelbizzarro.deviantart.com/art/Bark-Alphabet-04-21-2...
--
prof.Bizzarro
Noon light through foliage somewhere in Ikaria last summer
Photo blogged in my friend Nana's article: "Simply Mother"
Location: «Τα Μονοπάτια στο Φαράγγι της Χάλαρης »
Related article in Eleni's blog: «Hippie Island! ☀»
this is my first question mark that I find after years of dendrotypographic research. Philosophers and similar persons that give itself many questions will be happy.
**definition of dendrotypography in prof.Bizzarro’s dictionary: “the science and the art of finding, studying and using the alphabet letters that appear spontaneously on the bark of trees, and in particular of plane trees”
--
questo è il mio primo punto interrogativo che ho trovato dopo anni di ricerca dendrotipografica. Filosofi e simili persone che si pongono tante domande saranno felici.
**definizione di dendrotipografia nel dizionario del prof.Bizzarro: “la scienza e l’arte di trovare, studiare ed utilizzare le lettere dell’alfabeto che appaiono spontaneamente sulla corteccia degli alberi, e in particolare dei platani”
*** (CC)BY 4.0 prof.Bizzarro www.bazardelbizzarro.net ***
Old guys playing backgammon under the shade of a huge plane tree in Chania Crete - nice way to pass your time .....
The Diarizos Valley lies west to south west of the Troodos mountain range and takes its name from the river Diarizos which runs through it. This valley has a wide variety of fauna and flora, with a number of protected species.
The Troodos National Forest Park covers an area of 9,147 hectares around Mount Olympus. It is an area of great natural beauty, suitable for activities such as hiking, biking and camping .
Cyprus has the warmest climate and warmest winters in the Mediterranean part of the European Union.
Agradable camino flanqueado por plátanos que va desde la Font Vella hasta la Vil·la Joana, en Vallvidrera, el barrio de montaña de Barcelona.
---
Vallvidrera, Barcelona.
View looking upstream on the River Tiber (Fiume Tevere) towards Tiber Island (Isola Tiberina) and Fabricius' Bridge (Ponte Fabricio), Rome (Italy).
This view looks NW from where the Ponte Palatino meets the river embankment. The nearest trees are plane trees, similar but not necessarily the same as the London plane trees.
The main building on the island is The Basilica of St. Bartholomew on the Island (Basilica di San Bartolomeo all'Isola). It is a 10th Century foundation, rebuilt after flood damage in 1624 with restorations in 1852.
----- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Bartolomeo_all%27Isola
To the R is Fabricius' Bridge (Ponte Fabricio; Pons Fabricius) also known as Bridge of the Four Heads (Ponte dei Quattro Capi). Urban and architectural continuity in Rome is so commonplace that it is all too easy to take things for granted, especially if you don't walk around with your head buried in a guide book, or aren't an architectural expert. Architectural styles from Roman to 19th Century just seem to merge into a continuum, and so many things turn out to much older than you might at first assume. I had no idea when I took this shot that this bridge was Ancient Roman, built in the 1st Century BC (62 BC), and is still intact and in use from that time ! It is the oldest bridge in Rome still in its original state.
----- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pons_Fabricius
Just visible far L behind the trees Is Cestius' Bridge (Ponte Cestio; Pons Cestius), which dates from just a few years later than Ponte Fabricio (46 BC) but was rebuilt and extended in the 19th Century.
----- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pons_Cestius
----------
LONDON - PARIS - CATANIA - ROME - LONDON ----- DAY 8
Photo from the eighth day of our crazy long distance rail trip from home (London) to Sicily. We had had an unscheduled but happy first night stopover in Paris because our Eurostar train out of London was badly delayed due to 'a fatality [unexplained - perhaps fortunately] on the train'. We therefore missed our onward sleeper train connection to Rome, so spent our second day in Paris. We left Paris that evening, on the equivalent sleeper train service a day later. We reached Rome during the third day, where we changed to a daytime train for Catania, Sicily, arriving there the same evening. Our fourth day was our first full day in Sicily, and we spent this in the centre of Catania itself. We spent our fifth day on an excursion to Mount Etna run by GeoEtnaExplorer. We chose this tour company because the guides are geologists. Our particular tour went high up on the flanks on the summit, but not to the summit proper. For this sixth day, our final full day in Sicily, we took the bus from Catania (our base) to Siracusa, in search of Ancient Greek remains, while also getting distracted by other interesting sights, and some excellent ice cream, at various points in the day. But perhaps the most spectacular thing was the huge thunderstorm which hit us in the early part of the afternoon. The seventh day was the start of our homeward journey, for which we took our sixth train of the trip, from Catania and ending with an overnight stop in Rome. We spent the eighth day on a long walk through the heart of Rome, where we hadn't been back since I worked there briefly many years ago, before continuing our way home to London by catching a sleeper train that evening to Paris.
By the end of the whole holiday trip we had seen things and sites from ancient Greek time to modern, so the trip felt like a mini Grand Tour. Or given the rich mythology of Sicily, Etna and the Straits of Messina (Odysseus, the Cyclops, Scylla & Charybdis, etc.) perhaps our trip was like a modern mini Odyssey of our times. Odysseus took ten years to get home. It took us ten trains - but no monsters.
----------
Photo
Brian Roy Rosen
Uploaded to Flickr September 10, 2013
© Darkroom Daze Creative Commons.
If you would like to use or refer to this image, please attribute.
ID: DSC_6844 - Version 2ps
Normally, I would not be able to collect leaves, branches and bark from a Plane tree or a Sycamore tree because the branches are up so high, they cannot be climbed.
Bark cannot be peeled away, since it exposes the wood inside and could result in the failure of the whole tree it not protected.
In Autumn, I can collect the gigantic leaves when they fall. But I've always hoped to find a living leaf that was bigger than my head. (Different people have different goals.)
That's why this hundred-year hurricane was an opportunity for me and my duckie rain boots.
Collected in Ewen Park, Riverdale, Bronx, New York after Hurricane Irene August 28, 2011.
The London Planes of Shelbourne Street north of Haultain. This week memorial medallions were installed along both sides of the Victoria section of Shelbourne, to raise awareness that Shelbourne is a Road of Remembrance, its London Planetrees living memorials to the thousands of British Columbians who died in the Great War of 1914-18.
A shot taken near the Thau Lagune, in the South of France.
I am born and raised here... and I missed it.
View it better and on black on Fluidr !!!
With it’s 105 year old London Plane Tree standing sentinel, the 150 year old “Thornebridge” has just come out of a 21 year long restoration.
Built in 1868 on the bank of the Goulburn River at Murchison, Victoria, Thornebridge Hotel and Store saw 9 custodians up to its delicensing in 1969 and abandonment in the mid 70s.
The current custodians began the epic restoration and renovation in 1996, replacing a lot of structure and fittings that had been stolen in the intervening years.
Both the building and tree are Heritage listed.
More history and information www.thornebridge.com.au/our-story/#The-Thornebridge-Story
I recently read the interesting travel book "The Italian Lakes" (1928) by the French composer Gabriel Fauré. That's why I had a look in my photo archives for pictures I myself took in 1990 when visiting Lugano in Switzerland and also some of the Italian lakes nearby.
Aix Cathedral (Cathédrale Saint-Sauveur d'Aix) in Aix-en-Provence in southern France is a Roman Catholic cathedral and the seat of the Archbishop of Aix.
It is built on the site of the 1st century Roman forum of Aix. Built and re-built from the 12th until the 19th century, it includes Romanesque, Gothic and Neo-Gothic elements, as well as Roman columns and parts of the baptistery from a 6th-century Christian church. It is a national monument of France.
According to the Christian tradition, the first church on the site was founded by Saint Maximinus of Aix, who arrived in Provence from Palestine with Mary Magdalene on a boat belonging to Lazarus. Maximin built a modest chapel on the site of the present cathedral and dedicated it to the Holy Saviour (le Saint Sauveur).
During the invasion of the Saracens in the 8th and 9th centuries, the original chapel of Saint-Sauveur was destroyed.
The building of the new church was interrupted by the Black Death and then the Hundred Years' War. Work did not resume for 130 years, until 1472, when the last bay was built. The façade took another thirty years, and the last statues were not put in place until 1513, at the beginning of the Renaissance.
The doors of the cathedral were commissioned by the chapter in 1505, and were carved of walnut by the brothers Raymond and Jean Bolhit of Aix and by the Toulon sculptor Jean Guiramand.
The doors feature four figures in high relief of the major prophets of the Old Testament (Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and Jeremiah).
Above the prophets are the figures of twelve Sybils, pagan fortune-tellers from antiquity, honoured by medieval Christian scholars for having forecast the birth, death and resurrection of Christ.
The figures are framed with garlands of pomegranates and acorns, bunches of grapes, symbols of the Eucharist, a lion, a dragon and other fantastic animals: an aspic (another type of dragon) and a basilisk, a cock with the tail of a snake, representing the battle between good and evil.
Aix-en-Provence; Provençal Occitan, or simply Aix (pronounced: "Ex", medieval Occitan Aics), is a city-commune in south of France, some 30 km (19 mi) north of Marseille.
It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture.
The population of Aix is approximately 143,000. Its inhabitants are called Aixois or, less commonly, Aquisextains.
Aix (Aquae Sextiae) was founded in 123 BC by the Roman consul Sextius Calvinus, who gave his name to its springs, following the destruction of the nearby Gallic oppidum at Entremont.
Aix, which during the Middle Ages was the capital of Provence, did not reach its zenith until after the 12th century, when, under the houses of Barcelona/Aragon and Anjou, it became an artistic centre and seat of learning.
Aix passed to the crown of France with the rest of Provence in 1487, and in 1501 Louis XII established there the parliament of Provence, which existed until 1789. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the town was the seat of the Intendance of Provence.
The local Aix dialect, rarely used and spoken by a rapidly decreasing number of people, is part of the provencal dialect of Occitan language. The provencal for "Aix-en-Provence" is "Ais de Prouvènço". Most of the older streets in Aix have names in both Provençal and French.
Aix is often referred to as the city of a thousand fountains. Among the most notable are the 17th-century Fontaine des Quatre Dauphins (Fountain of the Four Dolphins) in the Quartier Mazarin, designed by Jean-Claude Rambot, and three of the fountains down the central Cours Mirabeau: At the top, a 19th-century fountain depicts the "good king" René holding the Muscat grapes that he introduced to Provence in the 15th century; halfway down is a natural hot water fountain (34 °C), covered in moss, dating back to the Romans; and at the bottom at la Rotonde, the hub of modern Aix, stands a monumental fountain from 1860 beneath three giant statues representing art, justice and agriculture.
In the older part of Aix, there are also fountains of note in the Place d'Albertas and the Place des Trois-Ormeaux.
Unlike most of France which has an oceanic climate, Aix-en-Provence has a Mediterranean climate.
Wikipedia
Aix Cathedral (Cathédrale Saint-Sauveur d'Aix) in Aix-en-Provence in southern France is a Roman Catholic cathedral and the seat of the Archbishop of Aix.
It is built on the site of the 1st century Roman forum of Aix. Built and re-built from the 12th until the 19th century, it includes Romanesque, Gothic and Neo-Gothic elements, as well as Roman columns and parts of the baptistery from a 6th-century Christian church. It is a national monument of France.
According to the Christian tradition, the first church on the site was founded by Saint Maximinus of Aix, who arrived in Provence from Palestine with Mary Magdalene on a boat belonging to Lazarus. Maximin built a modest chapel on the site of the present cathedral and dedicated it to the Holy Saviour (le Saint Sauveur).
During the invasion of the Saracens in the 8th and 9th centuries, the original chapel of Saint-Sauveur was destroyed.
The building of the new church was interrupted by the Black Death and then the Hundred Years' War. Work did not resume for 130 years, until 1472, when the last bay was built. The façade took another thirty years, and the last statues were not put in place until 1513, at the beginning of the Renaissance.
The doors of the cathedral were commissioned by the chapter in 1505, and were carved of walnut by the brothers Raymond and Jean Bolhit of Aix and by the Toulon sculptor Jean Guiramand.
The doors feature four figures in high relief of the major prophets of the Old Testament (Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and Jeremiah).
Above the prophets are the figures of twelve Sybils, pagan fortune-tellers from antiquity, honoured by medieval Christian scholars for having forecast the birth, death and resurrection of Christ.
The figures are framed with garlands of pomegranates and acorns, bunches of grapes, symbols of the Eucharist, a lion, a dragon and other fantastic animals: an aspic (another type of dragon) and a basilisk, a cock with the tail of a snake, representing the battle between good and evil.
Aix-en-Provence; Provençal Occitan, or simply Aix (pronounced: "Ex", medieval Occitan Aics), is a city-commune in south of France, some 30 km (19 mi) north of Marseille.
It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture.
The population of Aix is approximately 143,000. Its inhabitants are called Aixois or, less commonly, Aquisextains.
Aix (Aquae Sextiae) was founded in 123 BC by the Roman consul Sextius Calvinus, who gave his name to its springs, following the destruction of the nearby Gallic oppidum at Entremont.
Aix, which during the Middle Ages was the capital of Provence, did not reach its zenith until after the 12th century, when, under the houses of Barcelona/Aragon and Anjou, it became an artistic centre and seat of learning.
Aix passed to the crown of France with the rest of Provence in 1487, and in 1501 Louis XII established there the parliament of Provence, which existed until 1789. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the town was the seat of the Intendance of Provence.
The local Aix dialect, rarely used and spoken by a rapidly decreasing number of people, is part of the provencal dialect of Occitan language. The provencal for "Aix-en-Provence" is "Ais de Prouvènço". Most of the older streets in Aix have names in both Provençal and French.
Aix is often referred to as the city of a thousand fountains. Among the most notable are the 17th-century Fontaine des Quatre Dauphins (Fountain of the Four Dolphins) in the Quartier Mazarin, designed by Jean-Claude Rambot, and three of the fountains down the central Cours Mirabeau: At the top, a 19th-century fountain depicts the "good king" René holding the Muscat grapes that he introduced to Provence in the 15th century; halfway down is a natural hot water fountain (34 °C), covered in moss, dating back to the Romans; and at the bottom at la Rotonde, the hub of modern Aix, stands a monumental fountain from 1860 beneath three giant statues representing art, justice and agriculture.
In the older part of Aix, there are also fountains of note in the Place d'Albertas and the Place des Trois-Ormeaux.
Unlike most of France which has an oceanic climate, Aix-en-Provence has a Mediterranean climate.
Wikipedia