Hauts-de-France in the context of "Métropole Européenne de Lille"

Boulogne-sur-Mer (French: [bulɔɲ syʁ mɛʁ] ; Picard: Boulonne-su-Mér; Dutch: Bonen; Latin: Gesoriacum or Bononia), often called just Boulogne (UK: /bʊˈlɔɪn/, US: /buːˈloʊn, buːˈlɔɪn/), is a port city in Northern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department of Pas-de-Calais. Boulogne lies on the Côte d'Opale, a touristic stretch of French coast on the English Channel between Calais and Normandy, and the most visited location in the region after the Lille conurbation. Boulogne is its department's second-largest city after Calais, and the 183rd-largest in France. It is also the country's largest fishing port, specialising in herring.

Boulogne is an ancient town and was the main Roman port for trade and communication with its Province of Britain. After a period of Germanic presence following the collapse of the Empire, Boulogne was integrated into the County of Boulogne of the Kingdom of France during the Middle Ages. It was occupied by the Kingdom of England numerous times due to conflict between the two nations. In 1805 it was a staging area for Napoleon's troops for several months during his planned invasion of the United Kingdom.

French Flanders (French: Flandre française [flɑ̃dʁ(ə) fʁɑ̃sɛːz]; Dutch: Frans-Vlaanderen; West Flemish: Frans-Vloandern) is a historical and cultural region of France. it was historically part of the historical County of Flanders, now Flanders In Belgium where Flemish—a Low Franconian dialect cluster of Dutch—was (and to some extent, still is) traditionally spoken along with Roman Flemish, typically referred to as a French dialect (also called Ch’ti or, most commonly, Picard). The region lies in the modern-day northern French region of Hauts-de-France, and roughly corresponds to the arrondissements of Lille, Douai and Dunkirk on the northern border with Belgium. Together, with French Hainaut and Cambrésis, it makes up the French Department of Nord.

Lille (/ˈliːl/, LEEL; French: [lil] ; Dutch: Rijsel [ˈrɛisəl] ; Picard: Lile; West Flemish: Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, within French Flanders. Positioned along the Deûle river, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France region, the prefecture of the Nord department, and the main city of the European Metropolis of Lille.

The city of Lille proper had a population of 236,234 in 2020 within its small municipal territory of 35 km (14 sq mi), but together with its French suburbs and exurbs the Lille metropolitan area (French part only), which extends over 1,666 km (643 sq mi), had a population of 1,515,061 that same year (January 2020 census), the fourth most populated in France after Paris, Lyon, and Marseille. The city of Lille and 94 suburban French municipalities have formed since 2015 the European Metropolis of Lille, an indirectly elected metropolitan authority now in charge of wider metropolitan issues, with a population of 1,182,250 at the January 2020 census.

Picard (/ˈpɪkɑːrd/ PIK-ard, also US: /pɪˈkɑːrd, ˈpɪkərd/ pih-KARD, PIK-ərd, French: [pikaʁ] ) is a langue d'oïl of the Romance language family spoken in the northernmost of France and parts of Hainaut province in Belgium. Administratively, this area is divided between the French Hauts-de-France region and the Belgian Wallonia along the border between both countries due to its traditional core being the districts of Tournai and Mons (Walloon Picardy).

The language or dialect is referred to by different names, as residents of Picardy call it simply Picard, but in the more populated region of Nord-Pas-de-Calais it is called Ch'ti or Ch'timi (sometimes written as Chti or Chtimi). This is the area that makes up Romance Flanders, around the metropolis of Lille and Douai, and northeast Artois around Béthune and Lens. Picard is also named Rouchi around Valenciennes, Roubaignot around Roubaix.

Normandy (/ˈnɔːrməndi/ NOR-mən-dee; French: Normandie [nɔʁmɑ̃di] ; Norman: Normaundie) is the northwesternmost of the eighteen regions of France, roughly coextensive with the historical Duchy of Normandy.

Normandy is divided into five administrative departments: Calvados, Eure, Manche, Orne and Seine-Maritime. It covers 29,906 square kilometres (11,547 sq mi), comprising roughly 5% of the territory of metropolitan France. Its population of 3,322,757 accounts for around 5% of the population of France. The inhabitants of Normandy are known as Normans, and the region is the historic homeland of the Norman language. The neighboring regions are Hauts-de-France and Ile-de-France to the east, Centre-Val de Loire to the southeast, Pays de la Loire to the south, and Brittany to the southwest. Its prefecture and largest city is Rouen, although the regional council sits in Caen, making Normandy one of two regions in France (along with Bourgogne-Franche-Comté) in which the prefect does not sit in the same city as the regional council.

Nord (French pronunciation: [nɔʁ] ; officially French: département du Nord; Picard: départémint dech Nord; Dutch: Noorderdepartement, lit. 'northern department') is a department in Hauts-de-France region, France bordering Belgium. It was created from the western halves of the historical counties of Flanders and Hainaut, and the Bishopric of Cambrai. The modern coat of arms was inherited from the County of Flanders.

Nord is the country's most populous département. It had a population of 2,608,346 in 2019. It also contains the metropolitan region of Lille (the main city and the prefecture of the département), the fourth-largest urban area in France after Paris, Lyon and Marseille. The department is the part of France where the French Flemish dialect of Dutch has historically been spoken as a native language. Similarly, the distinct French Picard dialect Ch'ti is spoken there.

Picardy (/ˈpɪkərdi/; Picard and French: Picardie, French: [pikaʁdi] , Picard: [piˈkaʀdi]) is a historical and cultural territory and a former administrative region located in northern France. The first mentions of this province date back to the Middle Ages: it gained its first official recognition in the 13th century through the nation of Picardy at the University of Paris and entered French administration in the 14th century. Unlike regions such as Normandy, Brittany, or Champagne, Picardy was never established as a duchy, county, or principality, and its boundaries fluctuated over the centuries due to the political instability in the area it covered. Since 1 January 2016, it has been part of the new region of Hauts-de-France.

The first geographic description of Picardy appeared in the late central Middle Ages, including the bishoprics of Amiens, Beauvais, Arras, Tournai, and Thérouanne. In the late Middle Ages, it also encompassed Saint-Quentin, Douai, Abbeville, Béthune, Clermont, and other towns like Noyon, Valenciennes, Boulogne-sur-Mer, Hesdin, and Laon. At that time, Picardy was divided into Upper and Lower Picardy: Upper Picardy was closer to Île-de-France, while Lower Picardy, which Barthélemy the Englishman referred to as Hainaut, was closer to Flanders and Brabant.

Cambrai (US: /kæmˈbreɪ, kɒ̃ˈ-/, French: [kɑ̃bʁɛ] ; Picard: Kimbré; Dutch: Kamerijk), formerly Cambray and historically in English Camerick or Camericke, is a city in the Nord department and in the Hauts-de-France region of France on the Scheldt river, which is known locally as the Escaut river.

A sub-prefecture of the department, Cambrai is a town which had 32,501 inhabitants in 2018. It is in the heart of the urban unit of Cambrai with 46,772 inhabitants. Its functional area, a more extensive range, included 94,576 inhabitants in 2018. With Lille and the towns of the former Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin, it is also part of the Metropolitan area of Lille [fr] which has more than 3.8 million inhabitants.