Vall de Laguar, Bars de Laguar

Stable territory and people aided the creation of the Catalan state in the 10th Century. In 778 AD Charlemagne, future emperor of the Occident, son of the King of the Franks, Pépin le Bref, and founder of the Carolingien dynasty, organised the area into counties. The Marca Hispanica and other parts of the Pyrénées were to anticipate a push by the Arabs like that of 711 AD. The homogenous nature of the region enticed the Emperor Louis le Pieux, Charlemagne's successor, to establish a structure of five counties, prefiguring the future Catalonia. Named by the Emperor, the counts, whose titles were hereditary, organised lands and populations which were at that time distancing themselves from the authority of the declining Carolingienne dynasty. In the spirit of the time the Count of Barcelona declined the guardianship of the Carolingienne's Marca hispanica and took his independence from the successor, King Hugues Capet in 988 AD. Now divorced from Latin, the Catalan language was spoken at court during this period.