The French also colonized the region. In 1702 they founded a settlement on the Mobile River near its mouth, constructing "Fort Louis." For the next nine years this was the French seat of government of New France, or "La Louisiane" (Louisiana). In 1711, they abandoned Fort Louis because of repeated flooding. Settlers rebuilt a fort on higher ground known as "Fort Conde". This was the start of what developed as present-day Mobile, the first permanent European settlement in Alabama. Biloxi was another early French settlement on the Gulf Coast, to the west in what is now Mississippi.