Ouistreham

Ouistreham (wistʁe.am) is a commune in the Calvados department in Normandy region in northwestern France. Ouistreham is a small port with fishing boats, leisure craft and a ferry harbour. It serves as the port of the city of Caen. The town borders the mouth of the Canal de Caen à la Mer. The name Ouistreham derives from Saxon ham, meaning 'village'. There is no clear explanation for the first part of the name. A popular etymology is based on Middle French ouistre (Old French oystre), meaning 'oyster'. Actually most linguists agree on a Saxon origin, meaning Western or West (though some other linguists have claimed that it derives from the Saxon word meaning Eastern), because of the presence of Saxon-speaking settlers from England in Viking Normandy. If we follow this theory, 'Ouistreham' is a homonym of 'Westerham' in Kent. Ouistreham has been a trading port since the Middle Ages. The harbour is now a part of "Port de Caen-Ouistreham". Since the beginning of the 20th century, it has been a bathing beach on the "Riva Bella". On 6 June 1944, No. 4 Commando landed at Ouistreham (codenamed Sword) and fought their way to Pegasus Bridge, with the 177 Free French of the No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando given the honour of spearheading the advance. The assault on Ouistreham was featured in the movie The Longest Day, although the film location for Ouistreham was at the nearby village of Port-en-Bessin. A "Roman camp" (Catillon or Castillon) was located on the left bank of the Orne near Bénouville. It has been leveled, only a small part of the northwest rampart remains. In reality, modern archeology excludes the hypothesis that it is a Roman camp, at least not from the High Empire, archaeologists having never unveiled a Roman camp dating from this period in the North from Gaul, apart from Arlaines at Ressons-le-Long (Aisne), and probably not from the Lower Empire either. The expression Roman Camp or Caesar's Camp generally applies to works dating from the Iron Age or the Middle Ages.