- published: 04 Mar 2015
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Hautes-Alpes (French pronunciation: [ot.z‿alp]; Occitan: Auts Aups) is a department in southeastern France named after the Alps mountain range.
Hautes-Alpes is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It consists of the southeast of the former province of Dauphiné and the north of Provence.
At the time when the department was created, the two mountain communes of La Grave and Villar-d'Arêne successfully campaigned to be included in Hautes-Alpes and not in the neighbouring department of Isère to which they had originally been assigned. This was because they hoped to benefit from the relative autonomy and certain fiscal privileges enjoyed by the region since the fourteenth century under the terms of the Statute of the Briançon Escartons.
Napoleon passed through Gap when he returned to reclaim France after his exile on Elba.
The department is surrounded by the following French departments: Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Drôme, Isère, and Savoie. Italy borders it on the east.