"Bastide" is a local term for a manor house in Provence, in the south of France, located in the countryside or in a village, and originally occupied by a wealthy farmer. A bastide is larger and more elegant than the farmhouse called a mas, and is square or rectangular, with a tile roof, walls of fine ashlar-stone sometimes covered with stucco or whitewashed, and often built in a square around a courtyard. In the 19th and 20th centuries, many bastides were used as summer houses by wealthy citizens of Marseille. More recently, most bastides in Provence have been transformed into expensive country homes.