The most potent symbol of Catalan identity is Mont Canigou, the mountain that sits between the French city of Prades and the Spanish border. For Catalans it is their sacred mountain and has been celebrated in poetry and literature.
Most of the region’s 10m Catalan speakers live in Spain, in an area stretching from the Pyrénées to Valencia. A mere 120,000 Catalan speakers live on the French side of the border in the department of Pyrénées-Orientales in the Languedoc-Roussillon region.
