Pyrénées-Orientales, also known as Northern Catalonia, are a department of the region of Occitania, Southern France, adjacent to the northern Spanish frontier and the Mediterranean Sea. It borders the departments of Ariège to the northwest and Aude to the north, the Mediterranean Sea to the east and the Spanish province of Girona in Catalonia to the south and the country of Andorra to the west. It also surrounds the tiny Spanish exclave of Llívia, and thus has two distinct borders with Spain. In 2019, it had a population of 479,979. Some parts of the Pyrénées-Orientales are part of the Iberian Peninsula. It is named after the Pyrenees mountain range.

Catalan, known in the Valencian Community and Carche as Valencian, is a Western Romance language. It is the official language of Andorra, and an official language of three autonomous communities in eastern Spain: Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and the Valencian Community, where it is called Valencian. It has semi-official status in the Italian comune of Alghero, and it is spoken in the Pyrénées-Orientales department of France and in two further areas in eastern Spain: the eastern strip of Aragon and the Carche area in the Region of Murcia. The Catalan-speaking territories are often called the Països Catalans or "Catalan Countries".