Grand Est: Alsace, Champagne & Lorraine

Before Rome, the Remi held the country around Reims, the Mediomatrici the Moselle around Metz, and Celtic tribes the Alsace plain; Roman Reims (Durocortorum) became one of the chief cities of northern Gaul, and Strasbourg began as the legionary camp of Argentoratum on the Rhine. Around 500 Clovis, king of the Franks, was baptised at Reims, and French kings were crowned in its cathedral for centuries — Joan of Arc brought Charles VII there in 1429. The Treaty of Verdun of 843, which split Charlemagne's empire, left the lands between France and Germany as a middle kingdom whose name survives in "Lorraine".

In the Middle Ages the Champagne fairs at Troyes drew merchants from across Europe, Alsace belonged to the Holy Roman Empire, and Lorraine was an independent duchy. Louis XIV annexed Strasbourg in 1681, and Lorraine passed to France in 1766 on the death of its last duke, Stanislas Leszczyński, former king of Poland, who had given Nancy its great square.

The 19th and 20th centuries made the region a battleground. After 1871 Alsace and the Moselle were annexed to Germany; they returned in 1918, were annexed again in 1940 and liberated in 1944–45. Verdun, in 1916, became the longest battle of the First World War and the symbol of French sacrifice. Since 1945 Strasbourg has been a symbol of reconciliation as seat of the Council of Europe and the European Parliament, while Lorraine's coal and steel industries have declined. The three old regions were merged into Grand Est in 2016, with Strasbourg as capital.

The region is really three identities under one name. Alsace is the most distinct: many older people still speak Alsatian, a Germanic dialect, street signs are often bilingual, and the timber-framed houses, storks on church roofs and winstubs feel closer to the Rhineland than to Paris. Parts of the Moselle speak a Franconian dialect known as Platt. Because both were German in 1905, when France separated church and state, Alsace and the Moselle keep a special "local law": priests, pastors and rabbis are still paid by the state, and Good Friday and 26 December are public holidays.

Religion is more mixed here than elsewhere in France, with Lutheran and Reformed churches in Alsace and an old Jewish presence in the villages. Christmas is the region's great season: Strasbourg's market, dating back to the 16th century, calls the city the "capital of Christmas", and Alsatian homes bake trays of bredele biscuits. In Lorraine, Saint Nicholas, the patron saint, is celebrated with parades in Nancy in early December.

Nancy has its own artistic heritage in the École de Nancy, the Art Nouveau movement of the glassmaker Émile Gallé and the Daum workshops, and Lorraine is also known for the crystal of Baccarat. Champagne is shaped by its wine trade, with the great houses' names on every avenue in Reims and Épernay, and the Cross of Lorraine, adopted by the Free French, remains a regional emblem.

Grand Est has about 5.5 million people. Strasbourg, with around 290,000 residents, is the largest city, followed by Reims (about 180,000), Metz, Mulhouse and Nancy (each roughly 100,000–120,000), then Colmar, Troyes and Charleville-Mézières. Much of the rest is farmland, forest and small towns, and the Ardennes, the Haute-Marne and the Meuse are thinly populated.

The economy has changed sharply. The coal mines and steelworks of Lorraine that once employed large workforces have largely gone, leaving towns that are still adjusting. Alsace is more prosperous, with manufacturing, notably around Mulhouse, pharmaceuticals and the European institutions in Strasbourg. Champagne is a large and profitable industry, and Reims is also a university and agricultural centre. Tens of thousands of residents cross daily to work in Luxembourg, Germany and Switzerland, and the border shapes wages, shopping and property prices.

Days follow the French pattern, with lunch around noon and shops closing on Sundays, but Alsatian towns keep tidier, earlier habits, and the harvest in the vineyards from September pulls in seasonal workers each year.

Alsace eats heartily. Choucroute garnie is sauerkraut cooked in white wine and piled with sausages, ham and pork; baeckeoffe is a slow-baked casserole of marinated meats and potatoes sealed in an earthenware dish; and flammekueche, or tarte flambée, is a very thin bread base spread with cream, onions and bacon and baked in a hot oven. Kougelhopf is a ring-shaped yeast cake with raisins and almonds, and munster is a strong, washed-rind cow's-milk cheese from the Vosges.

Lorraine gave France the quiche lorraine, an egg-and-cream tart with bacon, and the pâté lorrain, pork marinated in wine and baked in pastry. Its golden mirabelle plums go into tarts, jams and a clear brandy, while Nancy is known for its macarons and bergamotes, amber-coloured boiled sweets flavoured with bergamot, and Commercy for its madeleines. Champagne's contributions include the pink biscuits of Reims, dipped in a glass of Champagne, the andouillette of Troyes, a coarse tripe sausage, and the soft cheeses of Chaource and Langres.

Wine is central. Alsace is unusual in France for labelling its wines by grape — Riesling, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Gris, Sylvaner — and makes sparkling Crémant d'Alsace, while Champagne comes mainly from the Marne and Aube vineyards. Alsace is also France's main beer-brewing region, and fruit brandies such as kirsch are distilled in the valleys.

Strasbourg is the region's showpiece: the Grande Île, surrounded by the Ill, with the Gothic cathedral and its astronomical clock, the canals and half-timbered houses of Petite France, the German-era Neustadt and the European Parliament. South along the foot of the Vosges runs the Alsace wine route, through villages such as Obernai, Riquewihr, Ribeauvillé, Kaysersberg and Eguisheim, below the rebuilt castle of Haut-Koenigsbourg. Colmar, in the middle of it, has the canal quarter of Petite Venise and the Unterlinden Museum with Grünewald's Isenheim Altarpiece; Mulhouse has large car and railway museums, and Neuf-Brisach is one of Vauban's star-shaped fortified towns.

In Champagne, Reims has the cathedral of Notre-Dame, the Basilica of Saint-Remi and the Palace of Tau, while the Champagne houses offer tours of chalk cellars beneath Reims and along Épernay's Avenue de Champagne. The vineyards of the Montagne de Reims and the Marne valley, including Hautvillers, lie in between. Further south, Troyes has a medieval half-timbered old town, and Colombey-les-Deux-Églises holds de Gaulle's house and grave.

Lorraine offers Nancy's Place Stanislas and its Art Nouveau museum, and Metz's cathedral of Saint-Étienne and the Centre Pompidou-Metz. Verdun's battlefield includes the Douaumont ossuary and fort, and the destroyed villages. For nature, the Vosges crests road, the Grand Ballon, the forested Meuse valley in the Ardennes and the Lac du Der, where cranes stop on migration, are the main draws.