Provence or Languedoc – which is better?

There's an ancient British longing for the south of France – for the warmth, light and herbal aromas, the olives, vines and the deep-rooted civilisation that rounds out the sensuality. When the need comes upon you, it is all but irresistible. You must bung 10 kilos into the hand luggage and go.

But where? As everyone knows, there are two French souths divided by the River Rh?ne – Provence stretching east towards Italy, Languedoc west towards Spain. Both have beaches and mountains. Both may furnish sunlit serenity, though they were forged by peasants and fishermen. Both retain a Latin tendency to switch from revolt to revelry in the time it takes you to duck.

Provence has a thicker texture of traditional tourism. Fine and fancy folk have been going there since the early 19th century. Nobody visited Languedoc much before the Sixties, when some startling development opened up the coast. (There's nothing in Provence to match the ziggurats and pyramids of La Grande Motte.) And, even now, swathes of the Languedoc hinterland remain largely undiscovered.

There are other differences, not only of nuance. Below we tease a few of these out. We are excluding the C?te-d'Azur from Provence – on the (slightly shaky) grounds that it's a different region. We're keeping Roussillon, or French Catalonia, out of Languedoc for the same reason.

Landscapes

Everyone has a soft-focus image of Provence, which generally includes lavender, perched villages and old blokes playing pétanque. Quite right, too. You'll see all that as you roam the region. The villages were, though, perched not for aesthetic reasons but for defence. The pretty life is, in short, built on rough geography and turbulent history. Back from the coast, the land lifts sharp and wild to the Esterel and Maures mountains. Get in among the ravines and woodland and you'd never believe you were 15 minutes from a beach lounger. Further north, the Haut-Var rises rugged all over again – punctuated by defiant, hill-topping villages (Tourtour, Bargemon) and leading to the Verdon Gorges. Europe's version of the Grand Canyon has nature on a supernatural scale and ample terror for vertigo sufferers.

Beyond, around Digne, real hard-core Provence climbs to the Alps; further west, the Luberon hills are marginally more gentle, thus suitable for chattering-class summer holidays. But no one ever accused the Mont Ventoux of gentleness. Ask the Tour-de-France cyclists.

Languedoc doesn't have Provence's extremes of splendour – but it's plenty wild, all the more so that there are fewer visitors inland. So what's remote feels really remote. And it is overlain with even more wars, medieval massacres, riots and blood sports than its neighbour. This gives it a subtext of turmoil, even when it appears asleep.

It is usual to say that the region is a huge amphitheatre around the Med. This is correct. Out front, the vast and sun-roasted plain, heavy with vines, cedes to mineral hills covered in garrigue scrub and holm oaks. In summer, lavender and thyme make for the headiest possible strolling. Behind, real mountains start, in the east, with the Cévennes – where ancestral Protestantism somehow fits the contours of grandiose uplands all but unworkable. Nearby, the Tarn Gorges cut a magnificent gouge through limestone plateaux, revealing a lost world of stone villages and recreational canoeing.

Further west, the Haut-Languedoc remains largely unexplored. Curving south, the Corbières are France's finest forgotten mountains – soaring, rocky and riven with comely valleys.

Scores: Provence 9, Languedoc 8.

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Towns and villages

There's something hugely reassuring about arriving from rugged countryside into a Proven?al village. Whether it be in the Luberon (Gordes, Bonnieux) or the Haut-Var area (Aups, Moustiers-Ste-Marie, Chateaudouble) there'll perhaps be ramparts and vertiginous views. There will certainly be wriggling streets, fountains and little squares coated with plane trees and cafés. Spared the impact of industry, their shapes haven't significantly altered in generations. These are proper communities, held together by farming, feuds, family and festivities.

Provence has also long harboured a mission to cultivate. Aix, with its matchless Cours Mirabeau main avenue, evinces not the slightest self-doubt. Avignon has been convinced it's the centre of the cultural universe since the popes arrived in the 14th century. And Arles – with its Roman arena, memories of Van Gogh and Camargue cowboys galloping through whenever circumstances demand – remains the most Proven?al of the lot.

Yet there's nowhere in Provence that matches the elegance and rooted dynamism of Montpellier. The capital of Languedoc combines the south's finest old town with its most audacious modern development, around its largest and most graceful central square. It doesn't, though, have the Roman origins of its neighbours Narbonne and, especially, N?mes, where France's finest arena gives the impression that the last gladiator has just been dragged out. N?mes' achievement has been to retain the old stones and the sense of full-blooded life swirling round them. Further west, the much restored (even recreated) cité of Carcassonne seems to have landed direct from a starring role in a medieval myth.

Both Pézenas and the many-towered Uzès still possess the dignity of their former status, Uzès as France's oldest duchy, Pézenas as a regional centre important enough (Lord forgive it) to have been Molière's base for a season or two.

Languedoc has splendid villages – St Guilhem-le-Désert climbing a crevasse above the River Hérault, Minerve perched giddily above the Cesse gorges – but others are more workaday than their Proven?al neighbours, lacking, perhaps, the sheen (and surfeit of potters and artists) that tourism brings.

Provence 8, Languedoc 9

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Art and history

History is palpable in southern France because not much has happened to disturb it. The past pops through the present all the time. Up in the Proven?al Alps, in the Vallée des Merveilles, pre-historic man made rock carvings which have baffled everyone since. Later, the Greeks established Marseille, before the Romans developed Provence as a playground for the polymath, scattering arenas and theatres at Arles, Fréjus and elsewhere.

In the middle ages, the popes built their monumental Gothic palace in Avignon. It radiates authority still. Artists (not to mention crooks and whores) followed the papacy in, leaving cracking works for Avignon’s Petit Palais gallery.  Magnificent Cistercian houses at Sénanque, Silvacane and, especially, Thoronet testify to the awesome purity of at least some medieval faith.

More recently, Provence’s light, warmth and flexible morality have attracted artists as mosquitoes to a flickering flame. Van Gogh was in Arles, Signac in St Tropez and Picasso pretty much everywhere. Of the greatest names, only Cézanne was a native.  His memory runs like a seam through Aix – the visit to his studio being the most moving in town. Despite this artistic effervescence, remarkably few original works remain in the region. Aix’s Musée Granet has a selection, though lacks the richness of French art in the Musée Fabre, Montpellier.

Languedoc in general is, though, less considered, historically and artistically, than Provence, perhaps because less well-known. But, my, it’s had its moments. Near Béziers, the oppidum-d’Ensérune is a startling Celto-Iberian settlement from the 6th-century BC. The Etruscans were at Lattes (see the Musée Archéologique), the Greeks at Agde. The Musée-de-l’Ephèbe, at Le-Cap-d’Agde, has some wonderful finds, including a stunning nude bronze of the young Alexander the Great. If only the men on the nearby beach of Europe’s biggest naturist resort had a look at him, I’m convinced they’d cover up.

The Romans left not only the N?mes arena but also the city’s Maison Carrée, the best-preserved temple outside Italy. The whole is put in context by the new, and magnificent, Musée de la Romanité, directly across from the arena. Just up the road, the Pont-du-Gard is the finest classical aqueduct anywhere, bestriding the Gardon river as if completing nature’s magisterial design for the site.

There’s majesty, too, from the middle ages – not only at Carcassonne but also in the Corbières mountains to the south, where Cathar castles (Puilaurens, Queribus, Peyrepertuse) defy heaven from their summit-topping sites. No wonder Dan Brown and other dingbats get carried away with esoteric speculation. The Cathar heretics were still wiped out, of course – but they remain reference points for Languedoc’s insurgent spirit.

The 19th-century saw artists like Courbet and Bazille in Montpellier. You'll find them in the Musée Fabre, along with a section devoted to the works of Pierre Soulages and, through this summer 2018, a show covering Picasso's artistic development.

Provence 8, Languedoc 8

Food and drink

Our two regions share much, but also have their specialities. In Provence, and more especially Marseille, bouillabaisse is the world's most full-frontal fish stew, capable of causing collapse in the faint of stomach. A grand aioli – garlic mayonnaise with a floor show of accompaniments (warm cod, veg, salads) – is the finest summer lunch available. One bottle of rosé is a minimum.

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Look out for lamb from Sisteron and daube beef stew. The region's wines are overwhelmingly pink and much better than they used to be back in the headache-inducing days. But there are also fine whites from Cassis and excellent reds from both Bandol and the southern C?tes-du-Rh?ne. ("Cairanne", "Gigondas" or "Vacqueyras" on the label is usually a good sign.) Meanwhile, your aperitif should be pastis. Try Henri Bardouin rather than the mega-brands: it's much herbier.

It may not be a majority viewpoint, but I reckon Languedoc has an even richer larder, not least in the matter of shellfish. The Thau lagoon behind Sète abounds in mussels and oysters. Sète's own speciality – tielles – are pies of cuttlefish and onions, and quite the best thing that ever happened to cuttlefish.

Over in N?mes, brandade is a toothsome purée of salt cod, while the nearby Camargue provides the cattle for beef gardiane – with red wine, olives and garlic. Cevenol goats provide the puck-shaped pélardon cheese and then, over in the west of the region, we're into cassoulet country. Cassoulet is meaty southern life in rich stew form, and best eaten at the Chateau St Martin, Montrédon, outside Carcassonne.

Languedoc produces more wine than any other region in the world, and much of it was throat rot. No longer. Wines from the Corbières, Minervois, Fitou and C?teaux-du-Languedoc now range from acceptable to outstanding. Reds from St Chinian and Pic-St-Loup can be remarkable, while Picpoul-de-Pinet is the astringent white to accompany your shellfish.

Provence 7, Languedoc 8

Coasts and waterways

Even if we discount the C?te-d'Azur, Provence's coast remains one of the most desirable in Europe. Mountains drop direct to the sea, elsewhere longer beaches are backed by pines, and resorts of that permanent impermanence that tells you you're on holiday. The usual charge is that the whole stretch is now developed to saturation point. This is nonsense. Of course, there are throngs. But that merely indicates that you're where it's at. And there are soul-stirring stretches – the Maures and Esterel corniches, the calanques (inlets) between Marseille and Cassis – where wildness survives inviolate.

Best bet, perhaps, is to take a ferry to the Iles-d'Hyères – Porquerolles or Port-Cros. Meanwhile, the mighty Verdon gorges and nearby Ste-Croix lake cater for canoeing, rafting and sailing.

As discussed, Languedoc has fine gorges of its own, carved by the River Tarn. Its star waterway is, though, the 17th-century Canal-du-Midi – from Agde to Toulouse. Meanwhile, Languedoc's coast is quite unlike Provence's. From the Rh?ne delta almost to the Spanish frontier, beaches are long, flat and unkempt. Quite often, the sea filters inland to create huge lagoons which, cleared of mosquitoes, allowed the building of new resorts (La Grande Motte, le Cap-d'Agde, Port Leucate) and the uncertain extension of fishing ports into tourism (Palavas, Le Grau-du-Roi). Hard to argue that the resulting development is all charming, but it's mainly fun. Beyond Le Grau du Roi, the Espiguette beach is six miles or more of wildness around a Camargue sandbank. There are other vast, untouched stretches where, apparently, the writ of the Republic runs out.

Provence 9, Languedoc 8

Verdict

Provence (41/50) pips its neighbour (40/50) – but only just.