1 French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km2 (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries.
The people of the commune are known as Ahastar.[4]
Geographyedit
Locationedit
Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan is part of Cize/Garazi country which was a historical province in Lower Navarre. It includes three former parishes, sometimes counted as four groups of houses in the Middle Ages[5] and with five toponyms: Alciette, Ahaxe, Garatehegi, Ligeta, and Bascassan located at the confluence of the Laurhibar and Esteneko streams.
Alciette is the parish farthest away to the northeast in the combination of the three parishes.
Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan is located some 6 km south-east of Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port and can be accessed by Highway D18 running from close to there through the heart of the commune southeast to Lecumberry. The village is not on the highway and is left onto the country road Vierge-d'Ahaxe off the D18 heading southeast. There is a country road from Aincille in the west to the village of Bascassin in the commune and there are other country roads entering from the north and the southeast.[6]
Hydrographyedit
The commune is located in the Drainage basin of the Adour, the commune lands are watered by the Laurhibar, a tributary of the Nive, and a tributary of that, the Esteneko stream. The Apatéko stream, a tributary of the Arzubiko stream also crosses the territory of Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan.
Alsiette (1667,[23] regulations of the States of Navarre[26])
The Basque name for the people of this area is Alzietar.[5]
According to Jean-Baptiste Orpustan,[5]Alciette is derived from the medieval Alzueta which itself comes from the Basque alzu meaning "place where there are abundant alder trees".
The origin of this toponym could be the LatinLiger[5] (which was equally likely to be the origin of Loire).
Historyedit
The Lordship of Ahaxe, also called the Lordship of Cize, was allied with the Viscounts of Arbéroue in the 11th century as well as the lordships of Guiche and to the Counts of Biscay.[5]
Ahaxe and Alciette-Bascassan were reunited on 11 June 1842.[18]
Heraldryedit
Blazon:
Quarterly at one and four party per pale Azure with three escallops of Argent and Or with three bars in gules; at two gules with three escallops of Argent and bordure engrailed in Argent; at three Argent with bend engrailed in gules between two escallops gules.
Administrationedit
This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (April 2021)
List of Successive Mayors of Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan[30]
Economic activity is mainly agricultural. The commune is part of the zone designation of the Ossau-Iraty cheese.
Culture and heritageedit
Languagesedit
According to the Map of the Seven Basque Provinces published in 1863 by Prince Louis-Lucien Bonaparte, the Basque dialect spoken in Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan is eastern low Navarrese.
Civil heritageedit
There is a gaztelu zahar (a prehistoric fortified complex) at a place called Gaztalepo (Ahaxe), located 550 metres above sea level. There is also a lice or a fence surrounding a fortification running at 313 metres above sea level at a place called Gaztelua or Gastellia. These artifacts represent the ancient past of the commune.
There are several buildings, houses, and farms in the commune that are listed as historical monuments. These are:
^Brigitte Jobbé-Duval, Dictionary of country names - Pyrénées-Atlantiques, 2009, Ed. Archives and Culture, ISBN 978-2-35077-151-9 (in French)
^ abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzaaabacJean-Baptiste Orpustan, New Basque Toponymy, Ed. Presses universitaires de Bordeaux, 2006, ISBN 2867813964, page 140 (in French)
^ abcdefghijklmnopMinistry of Culture, Mérimée IA64000871 Presentation of the Commune (in French)
^ abcTopographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, Paul Raymond, Imprimerie nationale, 1863, Digitised from Lyon Public Library 15 June 2011, p. 3 (in French)
^ abChapter of Bayonne - Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
^Manuscript of the 18th century - Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
^Manuscripts from the 17th to the 18th centuries - Departmental Archives of des Pyrénées-Atlantiques
^ abcdTopographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, p. 4 (in French)
^ abcTitles published by don José Yanguas y Miranda (in Spanish)
^ abcDerecho de naturaleza que la merindad de San-Juan-del-pie-del-puerto, una de las seys de Navarra, tiene en Castilla - 1622 petit in-4° (in Spanish)
^Collection of manuscripts in 11 volumes of deliberations (1606 to 1789) - Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
^ abTopographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, p. 22 (in French)
^Topographic Dictionary of the Department of Basses-Pyrenees, p. 59 (in French)
^Regulations of the commandery of Irissarry - Departmental Archives of Pyrénées-Atlantiques (in French)
^Intercommunality of Pyrénées-Atlantiques Archived 2014-05-06 at the Wayback Machine, Cellule informatique préfecture 64, consulted on 9 November 2011 (in French)
^Des villages de Cassini aux communes d'aujourd'hui: Commune data sheet Ahaxe-Alciette-Bascassan, EHESS(in French).