Indre-et-Loire
French department in Centre-Val de Loire
Indre-et-Loire (French pronunciation: [ɛ̃dʁ‿elwaʁ] ; lit. 'Indre and Loire') is a department in west-central France named after the rivers Indre and Loire. In 2023, it had a population of 619,362. Sometimes referred to as Touraine, the name of the historic region, it is nowadays part of the Centre-Val de Loire region. Its prefecture is Tours and subprefectures are Chinon and Loches. Indre-et-Loire is a touristic destination for its numerous monuments that are part of the Châteaux of the Loire Valley.
History
Early times
Indre-et-Loire is one of the original 83 departments established during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from the former province of Touraine and of small portions of Orléanais, Anjou and Poitou. Its prefecture, Tours, was a centre of learning in the Early Middle Ages, having been a key focus of Christian evangelisation since St Martin became its first bishop around 375. From the mid-15th century, the royal court repaired to the Loire Valley, with Tours as its capital; the confluence of the Loire River and Cher River became a centre of silk manufacturing and other luxury goods, including the wine trade, creating a prosperous bourgeoisie.
“Indre-et-Loire” enters the record as french department in Centre-Val de Loire. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Indre-et-Loire, French and department can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q12556. VIAF identifies the subject as 127494899. The Library of Congress control number is n83214250. Authority coordinates are 47.250, 0.667. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2023 and 1790.
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This entry incorporates text from “Indre-et-Loire” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.