Granville (; Norman: Graunville) is a commune in the Manche department and region of Normandy, northwestern France. The chef-lieu of the canton of Granville and seat of the , it is a seaside resort and health resort of Mont Saint-Michel Bay, at the end of the , a former cod-fishing port and the first shellfish port of France. It is sometimes nicknamed "Monaco of the North" by virtue of its location on a rocky promontory. The town was founded by a vassal of William the Conqueror on land occupied by the Vikings in the 11th century. The old privateer city and fortification for the defence of Mont Saint-Michel became a seaside resort in the 19th century which was frequented by many artists and equipped with a golf course and a horse racing course. Home of the of industrialists, an important commune that absorbed the village of Saint-Nicolas-près-Granville in 1962, port and airport of South Manche, it has also been a Douzelage city since 1991, twinned with 20 European cities. Administratively, the islands of Chausey, the French Channel Islands, which include a small harbour, are part of the commune of Granville. The town is populated by 13,021 inhabitants, who are called Granvillais. Geography Location Granville is located at the edge of the English Channel at the extremity of the of the Cotentin. It defines the north of the Bay of Mont Saint-Michel and the south of the . The upper town is located on a peninsula surrounded by schist cliffs, known as Pointe du Roc or Cap Lihou. The rest of the town extends eastward inland, bounded on the north by the , a short coastal river, and on the south by alternating cliffs and beaches up to the Saigue stream. The commune has four sand beaches, one to the north between the peninsula and the river, three to the south on the bay. It occupies ; of mostly urbanised territory, but this urbanisation is now limited by the Natura 2000 European directive and the . The town is part of the of . The National Institute of Geographic Information and Forestry gives the co-ordinates as . It is at the centre of the . Closing in the north of the Bay of Mont Saint-Michel and its foreshore of a very gentle gradient, it enjoys the highest tides in Europe, up to of tidal range. This situation also sometimes leads to