Perpignan

Perpignan, a town of France, and a fortress of the first rank (dept. Pyrénées-Orientales), stands on the river Têt, 7 miles from the Mediterranean, 40 by rail S. of Narbonne, and 17 from the Spanish frontier. It commands the passes of the Eastern Pyrenees, and is defended on the south by a citadel, which encloses the old castle of the Counts of Roussillon, and by a detached fort. The streets are narrow and the houses of semi-Moorish construction, and show evidences of Spanish influence. The cathedral (begun in 1324), the Moorish-Gothic cloth-hall or bourse (1396), the town-house (1692), the building of the former university (1349-French Revolution), the palace of justice, and a college are the principal public buildings and institutions. Good red wine is made, sheep and silkworms are bred, vegetables and fruit grown, brandy distilled, cloth woven, and corks cut; and there is a good trade in wine, spirits, wool, cork-bark, oil, cloth, and silk. As capital of the former county of Roussillon Perpignan was in the hands of the kings of Aragon from 1172 to its capture by France in 1475; it was restored to Spain in 1493; but Richelieu retook it in 1642, and France has possessed it ever since. Pop. (1891) 27,593.