Charente-Maritime

**Charente-Maritime** (Saintongeais: *Chérente-Marine*) is a department on the west coast of France in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region. It is named after the Charente river, the most important river in the department, and its position along the coast.

Its prefecture is the city of La Rochelle.

## History
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The department, as *Charente-Inférieure* ("Lower Charente" because it was in the lower part of the Charente river), is one of the 83 French departments made during the French revolution, on 4 March 1790.

It was created from parts of the old provinces of Saintonge and Aunis and small parts of Poitou and Angoumois.

The new department had seven districts: La Rochelle, Rochefort, Saint-Jean-d'Angély, Saintes, Pons, Montlieu and Marennes. The capital (now prefecture) was Saintes alternating with La Rochelle and Saint-Jean-d'Angély but soon was changed and Saintes was kept as the only capital.

In 1800, with the creation of the *arrondissements* in France, the seven districts were changed into six *arrondissements*: Saintes, Jonzac, Marennes, Rochefort, La Rochelle and Saint-Jean-d'Angély and in 1810 the capital was moved to La Rochelle.

The average amount of precipitation for the year in La Rochelle is . The month with the most precipitation on average is October with  of precipitation. The month with the least precipitation on average is July with an average of .

The average temperature for the year in La Rochelle is . The warmest month, on average, is July with an average temperature of . The coolest month on average is January, with an average temperature of .

## Administration
The department is managed by the *Departmental Council of the Charente-Maritime* in La Rochelle. Charente-Maritime is part of the region of Nouvelle-Aquitaine.

### Administrative divisions
There are 5 *arrondissements* (districts), 27 *cantons* and 469 *communes* (municipalities) in Charente-Maritime.

The following is a list of the 27 cantons of the Charente-Maritime department (with their INSEE codes), following the French canton reorganisation which came into effect in March 2015:

# Aytré (1701)
# Chaniers (1702)
# Châtelaillon-Plage (1703)
# Île d'Oléron (1704)
# Île de Ré (1705)
# La Jarrie (1706)
# Jonzac (1707)
# Lagord (1708)
# Marans (1709)
# Marennes (1710)
# Matha (1711)
# Pons (1712)
# Rochefort (1713)
# La Rochelle-1 (1714)
# La Rochelle-2 (1715)
# La Rochelle-3 (1716)
# Royan (1717)
# Saint-Jean-d'Angély (1718)
# Saint-Porchaire (1719)
# Saintes (1720)
# Saintonge Estuaire (1721)
# Saujon (1722)
# Surgères (1723)
# Thénac (1724)
# Tonnay-Charente (1725)
# La Tremblade (1726)
# Les Trois Monts (1727)

## Demographics
The inhabitants of Charente-Maritime are known, in French, as *Charentais maritimes* (women: *Charentaises maritimes*).

Charente-Maritime has a population, in 2014, of 637,089, for a population density of  inhabitants/km2. The *arrondissement* of Rochelle, with 210,151 inhabitants, is by far the largest. The other four, Rochefort,  Saintes, Jonzac and Saint-Jean-d'Angély, have respectively 187,843, 128,786, 56,973 and 53,336 inhabitants.

**Evolution of the population in Charente-Maritime**

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 bar:2008 at: 611714 fontsize:S text: 611,714 shift:(-18,5)
 bar:2014 at: 637089 fontsize:S text: 637,089 shift:(-18,5)

The 10 main cities in the department are:

## Gallery

La Rochelle2tours.jpg|La Rochelle
Cabanes ostréicoles au Château-d'Oléron.jpg|Oyster farms in the Oléron island
Talmont sur Gironde.jpg|Talmont-sur-Gironde
Jonzac 17 Église façade 2013.jpg|Jonzac
Fort boyard aout 2006-6.JPG|Fort Boyard
Hennessy cognac.jpg|Hennessy cognac barrels

## References
## Related pages
* Arrondissements of the Charente-Maritime department

## Other websites
* Departmental Council website 
* Prefecture website 
* Charente Maritime Tourisme