France’s best-value, most fluid wine region and certainly its most important in terms of volume of wine produced, and in terms of the importance of viticulture to the region’s economy. The Languedoc takes its name from a time when its inhabitants spoke Occitan, the language in which oc (rather than oil) is the word for ‘yes’, hence langue d’oc. It comprises the three central southern départements of the Aude, Hérault, and Gard, a sea of little other than vines just inland from the beaches of the Mediterranean (see map opposite and france).
