Editing Pas-de-Calais (section)

==History==
Inhabited since prehistoric times, the Pas-de-Calais region was populated in turn by the Celtic [[Belgae]], the [[Ancient Rome|Romans]], the [[Germanic peoples|Germanic]] [[Franks]] and the [[Alemanni]]. During the fourth and fifth centuries, the Roman practice of co-opting Germanic tribes to provide military and defence services along the route from [[Boulogne-sur-Mer]] to [[Cologne]] created a [[Germanic languages|Germanic]]-[[Romance languages|Romance]] linguistic border in the region that persisted until the eighth century.

[[Saxons|Saxon]] colonization into the region from the fifth to the eighth centuries likely extended the linguistic border somewhat south and west so that by the ninth century most inhabitants north of the line between [[Béthune]] and [[Berck]] spoke a dialect of [[Middle Dutch]], while the inhabitants to the south spoke [[Picard language|Picard]], a variety of [[Romance languages|Romance dialects]].

This linguistic border is still evident today in the [[toponyms]] and [[patronyms]] of the region. Beginning in the ninth century, the linguistic border began a steady move to north and the east.

Pas-de-Calais is one of the original 83 departments created during the [[French Revolution]] on 4 March 1790. It was created from parts of the [[provinces of France|former provinces]] of [[Calaisis]], formerly English, [[Boulonnais (land area)|Boulonnais]], [[Ponthieu]] and [[Artois]], this last formerly part of the [[Spanish Netherlands]].

Some of the costliest battles of [[World War I]] were fought in the region. The [[Canadian National Vimy Memorial]], {{convert|8|km|mi|0|spell=on}} from [[Arras]], commemorates the [[Battle of Vimy Ridge]] assault during the [[Battle of Arras (1917)]] and is [[Canada]]'s most important memorial in Europe to its fallen soldiers.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.greatwar.co.uk/french-flanders-artois/memorial-canadian-national-vimy-memorial.htm |title=Canadian National Vimy Memorial, France |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=2015 |website=The Great War UK |access-date=31 March 2017 |quote=The ridge runs in a direction from Givenchy-en-Gohelle in the north-west to Farbus in the south-east.}}</ref>

Pas-de-Calais was also the target of [[Operation Fortitude]] during [[World War II]], which was an [[Allies of World War II|Allied]] plan to deceive [[Oberkommando der Wehrmacht|the Germans]] that the [[Operation Overlord|invasion of Europe]] at D-Day was to occur here, rather than in [[Normandy]].<ref>{{cite book
  | last = Hakim
  | first = Joy
  | title = A History of Us: War, Peace and all that Jazz
  | publisher = Oxford University Press
  | year = 1995
  | location = New York
  | isbn = 0-19-509514-6 }}</ref>