Geography
Nord is part of the current Nord-Pas-de-Calais region and is surrounded by the French departments of Pas-de-Calais and Aisne, as well as by Belgium and the North Sea.
Situated in the north of the country along the western half of the Belgian frontier, the department is unusually long and narrow. Its principal city is Lille, which with nearby Roubaix, Tourcoing and Villeneuve d'Ascq constitutes the center of a cluster of industrial and former mining towns totalling slightly over a million inhabitants. Other important cities are Valenciennes, Douai, and Dunkirk. The principal rivers are the following:
Yser, Lys, Escaut, Scarpe, Sambre
| North sea West Flanders, Belgium |
West Flanders, Belgium | Hainaut, Belgium | ||
| Pas-de-Calais | Hainaut, Belgium | |||
| Nord | ||||
| Somme | Aisne | Hainaut, Belgium |
Read more about this topic: Nord (French Department)
Famous quotes containing the word geography:
“Ktaadn, near which we were to pass the next day, is said to mean Highest Land. So much geography is there in their names.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“At present cats have more purchasing power and influence than the poor of this planet. Accidents of geography and colonial history should no longer determine who gets the fish.”
—Derek Wall (b. 1965)
“Yet America is a poem in our eyes; its ample geography dazzles the imagination, and it will not wait long for metres.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)