Arrast-Larrebieu

Arrast-Larrebieu Ürrustoi-Larrebille
Commune
The road into Arrast
Location of Arrast-Larrebieu
Arrast-Larrebieu Show map of France Arrast-Larrebieu Show map of Nouvelle-Aquitaine
Coordinates: 43°17′39″N 0°50′56″W
Country	France
Region	Nouvelle-Aquitaine
Department	Pyrénées-Atlantiques
Arrondissement	Oloron-Sainte-Marie
Canton	Montagne Basque
Intercommunality	CA Pays Basque
Government
• Mayor (2020–2026)	Allande Davant[1]
Area ^1	7.56 km^2 (2.92 sq mi)
Population  (2022)[2]	92
• Density	12/km^2 (32/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
INSEE/Postal code	64050 /64130
Elevation	132–299 m (433–981 ft) (avg. 173 m or 568 ft)
^1 French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km^2 (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries.

Arrast-Larrebieu (French pronunciation: [aʁast laʁbjø]; Basque: Ürrustoi-Larrebille)[3] is a commune in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region of south-western France.

Geography

Arrast-Larrebieu General View

Arrast-Larrebieu is located in the former province of Soule some 12 km east by south-east of Saint-Palais and 10 km north by north-east of Mauléon-Licharre. Access to the commune is by the D243 road which branches off the D11 west of the commune and north of Espès-Undurein and passes through the village before continuing north-east to join the D115. The D135 from the D11 in the west to Moncayolle-Larrory-Mendibieu in the south-east passes through the south of the commune and the hamlet of Larrebieu. The commune is mainly farmland with many forests scattered throughout the commune.[4]

The Laxubie rises in the south of the commune and flows north past the village gathering many tributaries and joins the Apaure north of the commune. Several small streams rise in the west of the commune and flow west to join the Saison.[4]

Places and Hamlets

• Abbadia
• Aguelcheberry
• Aguerria
• Aitzaguer (ruins)
• Algalarrondo
• Arkabisquey
• Arrast
• Asconeguy
• Behety
• Bethulard
• Bou
• Garatia
• Gastelu
• Gastelu Arrast
• Gasteluchague
• Habiague
• Heguilus
• Hoilly
• Ibarbouen
• Lacoste
• Laplume
• Larçabal
• Larlette
• Larrebieu
• Larribet
• Mendiondo
• Oyhenart
• Poutou
• Sabalain
• Sagardoyburu
• Sallaberry
• Sunhary
• Tine

[5]

Toponymy

Arrast Fronton

The commune name in basque today is Ürrüstoi-Larrabile[6] or Ürrustoi-Larrebille.[3]

Jean-Baptiste Orpustan indicated that the spelling in Basque Arrast is sometimes given with the determinant Ürrüxtoia meaning "hazel tree grove". He also stated that larrabil means a "rounded moor, squat".[7]

The following table details the origins of the commune name and other names in the commune.

Name	Spelling	Date	Source	Page	Origin	Description
Arrast	Arrast	13th century	Raymond	11	Bayonne	Village
	Arrast	1690	Orpustan
	Larast	1690	Orpustan
	Larrast	1690	Orpustan
Larrebieu	Larrebiu	1384	Raymond	94	Notaries	Village
	Larrebiu	1690	Orpustan

Sources:

• Raymond: Topographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, 1863, on the page numbers indicated in the table. (in French)[8]
• Orpustan: Jean-Baptiste Orpustan, New Basque Toponymy[7]

Origins:

• Bayonne: Cartulary of Bayonne or Livre d'Or (Book of Gold)[9]
• Notaries: Notaries of Navarrenx[10]

History

Paul Raymond noted on page 11 of his 1863 dictionary that the commune had a Lay Abbey, vassal of the Viscounts of Soule.[8]

Larrebieu was merged with the commune of Arrast on 16 October 1842.[8]

Administration

Arrast-Larrebieu Community Hall

List of Successive Mayors[11]

From	To	Name	Party
1995	2014	Julien Erbin	UMP
2014	2026	Allande Davant

Inter-communality

The commune is part of seven inter-communal structures:

• the Communauté d'agglomération du Pays Basque;
• the Sanitation association of Pays de Soule;
• the AEP association of Pays de Soule;
• the inter-communal association of la Vallée;
• the Energy association of Pyrénées-Atlantiques;
• the inter-communal association for the construction and operation of the CES at Mauleon;
• the association to support Basque culture.

Demography

The inhabitants of the commune are known as Urrustoitars.[12] The population data given in the table and graph below for 1836 and earlier refer to the former commune of Arrast.

Historical population

Year Pop. ±% p.a. 1793 216 —     1800 212 −0.27% 1806 154 −5.19% 1821 191 +1.45% 1831 176 −0.81% 1836 200 +2.59% 1841 323 +10.06% 1846 308 −0.95% 1851 292 −1.06% 1856 261 −2.22% 1861 247 −1.10% 1866 283 +2.76% 1872 235 −3.05% 1876 265 +3.05% 1881 275 +0.74% 1886 259 −1.19% 1891 252 −0.55% 1896 246 −0.48%	Year Pop. ±% p.a. 1901 263 +1.35% 1906 251 −0.93% 1911 258 +0.55% 1921 242 −0.64% 1926 225 −1.45% 1931 215 −0.91% 1936 201 −1.34% 1946 203 +0.10% 1954 198 −0.31% 1962 173 −1.67% 1968 144 −3.01% 1975 128 −1.67% 1982 131 +0.33% 1990 123 −0.78% 1999 105 −1.74% 2007 96 −1.11% 2012 96 +0.00% 2017 95 −0.21%
Source: EHESS[13] and INSEE[14]

Economy

Economic activity is mainly agricultural (livestock and pasture). The town is part of the Appellation d'origine contrôlée zone designation of Ossau-iraty.

Culture and Heritage

Civil heritage

An enclosure with an earthen parapet (a protohistoric fort or Gaztelu zahar) at an altitude of 282 metres at a place called Gazteluxaga reflects the ancient past of the commune.

Religious heritage

The church of Sainte-Lucie

Hilarri in the Churchyard

Chapel at Larrebieu

The Parish Church of Sainte-Lucie (19th century) is registered as an historical monument.[15] It has a bell tower called Trinity or Souletin meaning the "top of the wall", pierced by bays for the bells with three roof peaks of approximately equal height, hence the name Trinity.[16] The church contains a Processional Cross (17th century) which is registered as an historical object.[17]

Notable people linked to the commune

• Abbadie d'Arrast Family, initially lay abbots whose descendants originated the construction of various chateaux (the Château d'Abbadie at Hendaye, Elorriaga at Ciboure).
• Jean-Louis Davant, born in 1935 in Arrast-Larrebieu, is a writer, poet, bertsolari, pastoralari, and academician.

See also

• Communes of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department

References

1. "Répertoire national des élus: les maires". data.gouv.fr, Plateforme ouverte des données publiques françaises (in French). 2 December 2020.
2. "Populations de référence 2022" (in French). The National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies. 19 December 2024.
3. ÜRRUSTOI-LARREBILLE, Auñamendi Eusko Entziklopedia (in Spanish)
4. Google Maps
5. Géoportail, IGN (in French)
6. Euskaltzaindia - Academy of the Basque language (Basque)
7. Jean-Baptiste Orpustan, New Basque Toponymy, Presses universitaires de Bordeaux, 2006, ISBN 2 86781 396 4 (in French)
8. Topographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, Paul Raymond, Imprimerie nationale, 1863, Digitised from Lyon Public Library 15 June 2011 (in French)
9. Manuscript from the 14th century in the Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
10. Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
11. List of Mayors of France (in French)
12. Pyrénées-Atlantiques, habitants.fr
13. Des villages de Cassini aux communes d'aujourd'hui: Commune data sheet Arrast-Larrebieu, EHESS (in French).
14. Population en historique depuis 1968, INSEE
15. Ministry of Culture, Mérimée IA64000734 Parish Church of Sainte-Lucie (in French)
16. Philippe Veyrin, The Basques, p. 241, Arthaud, 20 December 1975, ISBN 2700300386 (in French)
17. Ministry of Culture, Palissy PM64000036 Processional Cross (in French)

External links

• Arrast-Larrebieu on Géoportail, National Geographic Institute (IGN) website (in French)
• Araft and Larrebien on the 1750 Cassini Map