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Orléans (Municipality, Loiret, France)

Last modified: 2021-06-27 by ivan sache
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[Flag]         [Flag]

Flag of Orléans
Left: Ceremonial flag - Image by Arnaud Leroy, 18 September 2002
Right: Usual flag - Image by Ivan Sache, 18 September 2002


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Presentation of Orléans

The municipality of Orléans (114,644 inhabitants in 2011) is located on river Loire, 115 km south of Paris.

In the Gaul time, Canubium, located in the center of the Carnutes' territory, was the place of a druids' annual meeting there. The revolt against the Roman occupation broke out there in 52 BC. In 451, the town under the protection of Bishop St. Aignan resisted victoriously Attila's Huns.
During the 10th-11th centuries, Orléans was one of the centers of the young Capetian monarchy, the two other centers being Chartres and Paris.
Orléans is famous for the siege of 1428-1429 during the Hundred Years' War and the intervention of Joan of Arc (a.k.a. as la pucelle d'Orléans, pucelle being a familiar term for a virgin). The Joan of Arc's festival (Fêtes Johanniques) has been commemorating these events each spring since 1435 except during wartime. On 7 May, the "very authentic standard of Joan of Arc" is presented to the population.

Orléans is the birth town of the poet and polemist Charles Péguy (1873-1914), who was in the same time Dreyfusard, humanitarian Socialist, patriot (he died during First World War) and fervent Roman Catholic.

Orléans is also known for rose gardening and its forest.

There have been four princely houses of Orléans. The second house (Orléans-Valois) is famous for the poet Charles d'Orléans (1394-1465) and his son Louis II (1462-1515), King of France as Louis XII (1498-1515). The fourth house of Orléans (Orléans-Bourbon) is famous for Philippe II (1674-1723), a.k.a. le Régent(1715-1723, during the minority of Louis XV), Louis-Philippe Joseph (1747-1793), a.k.a. Philippe-Egalité, who voted the death of Louis XVI and was himself guillotinized later on, and his son Louis-Philippe II (1773-1850), King of the French as Louis-Philippe I (1830-1848).
Henri d'Orléans (b. 1903), Count of Paris and Orléaniste pretender to the throne of France, recently passed away. The members of the Orléans family are buried in the Royal Chapel of Dreux, not far from Versailles.

The Algerian city of Orléansville (later on El-Asnam and now Ech-Cheliff) as well as La Nouvelle-Orléans / New Orleans were named after the Orléans houses.

Ivan Sache, 20 November 1999


Flag of Orléans

The ceremonial flag of Orléans, as communicated by the municipal administration, is vertically divided yellow-red with the municipal coat of arms in the center.

On the coat of arms, the three white charges are cœurs-de-lis (lily hearts). The use of chief of France, "Azure three fleurs-de-lis or", recalls that Orléans was among the 36 "good towns" (bonnes villes) whose Mayor was invited to the Royal coronation ceremony. The cross below the shield is the War Cross (1939-1945).

The flag without the arms is widely used throughout the town. The flag with the coat of arms might probably be used for ceremonial purposes only and be kept somewhere inside the Town Hall.

Pascal Vagnat & Ivan Sache, 18 September 2002


Flag used in Vauquoius

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Flag of Orléans used in Vauquois - Image by Olivier Touzeau, 9 February 2021

Located on a hill overlooking the valley of the Meuse and the road from Verdun to Bar-le-Duc, the village of Vauquois was completely destroyed during the First World War. After the war, a native of Vauquois, General Desprez, had Vauquois adopted by the town of Orléans which funded the reconstruction of the village, at the bottom of the hill.
The flag of Orléans (photo, photo, photo) used in Vauquois is white with the municipal logo. This flag does not appear to be used in Orléans, though.

Olivier Touzeau, 9 February 2021


ADAS INRA, section of Orléans

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Banner of ADAS INRA Orléans - Image by Ivan Sache & Arnaud Leroy, 2 April 2005

INRA (Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique), founded in 1946, is a state agency depending both on the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Scientific Research.

In France, private companies with more than 50 employees must have a comité d'entreprise, whose members are elected by the staff and whose budget is a mandatory percentage of the wage bill. The main function of the comité d'entreprise is to arrange company-subsidized benefits for the staff.
Being a state agency, INRA cannot have a comité d'entreprise. The social function of the comité d'entreprise is provided by a non-profit making association called Association pour le Développement des Activités Sociales à l'INRA (ADAS INRA). Every INRA employee can join the association for a small fee, most of the budget of ADAS being allocated by INRA. Since INRA is geographically scattered all over France (including Corsica, Guadeloupe and French Guiana), ADAS is organized in local sections placed under the umbrella of national ADAS; each section has its own statutes, budget and organization, which have to fit the national ADAS statutes.
Every four years, membres of the ADAS section get together for an event called Adayades; there are sport Adayades and cultural Adayaydes. The last cultural Adayades took place in Aussois (in the Alps) last winter. The event was reported in a special issue of the ADAS newsletter, ADAS Info. A picture shows the vocal quartet from Orléans performing on stage, in front of the banner of the local section of Orléans.
The banner of the Orléans local section of ADAS is a vertical (25:10), forked flag, vertically divided yellow-red, like the municipal flag of Orléans, with the municipal coat of arms of Orléans near the top of the flag, surmounting the writing, in gold letters:

ADAS INRA
SECTION
D'ORLEANS

Ivan Sache, 2 April 2005


Cercle de la Voile du Centre

[Flag]         [Burgee]

Flag and burgee of CVC - Images by Ivan Sache, 21 April 2019

CVC (website) was registered on 4 December 1957 in Orléans; the club's Statutes were last modified on 27 November 2004.
The club is based at Étang du Puits, a man-made lake (180 ha) established in 1864 on the municipal territories of Argent-sur-Sauldre and Clémont (Cher) and Cerdon (Loiret).

The flag of CVC (photo, photo, photo) is quartered red-blue by a white cross; the burgee of CVC is a triangular version of the flag.

Ivan Sache, 21 April 2018