Анле: История и археология коммуны во Французском Басконии.

Anglet (ɑ̃ɡlɛt; , ) is a commune in the Pyrénées Atlantiques department in the Nouvelle Aquitaine region of southwestern France. Anglet lies in the traditional province of Labourd of the Northern Basque Country while its inhabitants have traditionally spoken Gascon (Occitan).

Anglet is served by the A63 autoroute, the D810 road from Bayonne to Anglet town, and the D260 road from Bayonne to the northern part of the commune and continuing south west towards Biarritz. During the winter season of 2013–2014 the A1, A2, C, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14, and N (evening) Chronoplus bus routes operated by the Transdev agglomeration de Bayonne serve Anglet connecting it to other communes in the metropolitan area: Bayonne, Biarritz, Bidart, Boucau, Saint Pierre d'Irube, and Tarnos.

Based on discoveries made, the oldest land in Anglet dates back to prehistory (mid Paleolithic) and Mousterian culture (from 100,000 to 35,000 BC). Various flint tools characteristic of the Mousterian period have been discovered. The use of splinters on both faces to make sharp points (scratcher, scraper) allows working on skins and making axes with wooden handles. Around Anglet, including the Tower of Lannes, Brindos, and Sutar, open air locations high above low swampy parts were preferred as in other parts of Basque Country (Saint Pierre d'Irube, Ilbarritz at Bidart, Duboscoa at Villefranque, Lahonce, Urt, and Bidache). The prefecture of the Aquitaine region, considering the knowledge elements of the archaeological heritage of the commune currently identified in the archaeological database of the Regional Directorate of Cultural Affairs of Aquitaine issued an order for the following sites: Brindos, Cote 50, La Ballastière of Micoteau (Sutar), and Hondritz referenced as having Paleolithic occupation. The sites in the Rue du Colombier and the Tower of Lannes are referenced to as prehistoric sites of refuge which also refers to occupation in proto historic times (Copper Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age).

During the Roman era (towards 400 AD), Bayonne served as a castrum (in Novempopulania) for a cohort large enough for a rampart to be built (still visible in some places) surrounding an area somewhat excessive for an Army (seven hectares), but no remains indicate that there was a city (no theatre, no ruins of villas or baths, etc.). At that time, the regional Roman capital was "Aquae Augustae" (Dax) and the people living in the geographical area between Dax and Oiartzun (which included the commune of Anglet) called themselves Tarbelli. Furthermore, there is evidence that outside these walls, there were many potters who worked for the Roman cohort.

Bayonne then had a monopoly on trade and fishing in the whole basin of the Adour from Biarritz to Capbreton. Bayonne tried to master the marshy strip of land that was once on the left bank of the river when the natural mouth of the Adour was much further north (located in the tenth century at Cape Breton then, after yet another quirk of the River, at Vieux Boucau from 1310 to 1578). The major event of this period was the diversion of the Adour. Trade in Bayonne declined due to the remoteness of the river mouth and especially the silting of the Adour that prevented large vessels enter the estuary. Louis de Foix, an engineer sent by the king, succeeded, after many efforts using local labour, in diverting the river to allow an exit for the Adour only from Bayonne. Rivalries and conflicts between Anglet and Bayonne continued for the jurisdiction and rights over this sandy strip of land that was now cut in half, with one part north of the Adour and not solely on the left bank of the river, which complicated the situation even more. A war of justification of the boundary marks and rights therefore intensified between the two cities to see who could enjoy the sands of Gauseirans where were identified as "Les Pignadas". The name of Gauseirans/Betenave would be resumed in Gibraltar and then "basquised" to Chimberta and Chiberta. In the texts of the city of Bayonne, it says to maintain the rights to the land and demand the sand. Conversely, England on its side tried to justify the demarcation, especially those "north of the river", and showed grazing agreements from 1395 and 1525 before the diversion ("to Betenave, located in the vast space of Gauseirans containing the sand and pignadas attached "to the farm lands" of Anglet"). This did not deter the rivalry that continued throughout the 17th and 18th centuries and finally ended in settlement agreements.

Besides the issue of communal boundaries, the rivalry was exacerbated by the antagonism of behaviour between the Bayonne bourgeoisie and the Anglet peasantry. At that time, the lords, nobles and bourgeois of Bayonne bought land at Anglet but fled from community measures and obligations (particularly in terms of taxation). Despite careful control of the people and the obstinacy of the peasants, some aristocrats from Bayonne won a fight which was not played on equal terms. At that time, many of the inhabitants of Anglet were herdsmen who sought ox carts to bring fertilizer to their land from the stables of Bayonne. These oxen were used to transport goods between Bayonne, Saint Jean de Luz and Spain as well as to maintain their vineyards, corn, or wheat fields. In the pignadas, the resin or "gem" is harvested from pine trees for producing candles or to allow the caulking of ships as well as for making soap, perfume, and many household goods. Plastic and synthetic products would destroy his employment and his crop. There were also plantations of cork oak used for many purposes (corks but also very fashionable for planting in the 19th century). During the Revolution and the Empire there was "a double movement of land grabbing and dilapidation of heritage" to convert land under cultivation at the expense of the old houses of Anglet who used communal land for their flocks. In 1812, an image of the town is provided by the Mayor of the time: "a population of 1965 souls ( ) houses are distant from each other without any rallying point that the church (Saint Léon) provided". At Anglet, most of the people were small farmers although some wealthy Bayonne people settled in the commune such as the binder and lithographer Jean Bernain who bought "Quintau" in 1787. The difficulties were compounded by the wars of the Revolution and the billeting of troops "at extraordinary and necessary expense occasioned by the cavalry (Napoleonic), the train of artillery, and the troops of the line" who stayed during their passage to the Spain. The same then occurred in 1814 by Wellington's British troops during the fighting that devastated the Blancpignon forest, then returning to Spain to face the routed Napoleonic army routed (who took refuge within the walls of Bayonne). Part of the population abandoned Anglet in 1813 and 1814 to escape to the north or south. In 1822 cholera struck Anglet. In March 1815, during the disorders caused by the Hundred Days and after the Battle of Waterloo, a Spanish army commanded by the Earl of Labisbal made a brief foray beyond the Bidassoa to Anglet and Ustaritz. These troops made a fighting retreat after an intervention by Louis Antoine, Duke of Angoulême, with the Spanish monarch Ferdinand VII.

In 1838–1839, Father Cestac acquired the property Châteauneuf to install the institution of Our Lady of refuge and create a community of servants of Mary away from the city and the critics (they collected young prostitutes wishing to exit). This property now has the last agricultural land between Chiberta forest and the Boulevard BAB. Father Cestac did not have much money which forced him to work the land with his community who were unaccustomed to working the land. The nuns founded a school, cultivated and cleared most of the land surrounding the Refuge, which grew considerably. Beyond the corn fields, near the forest, there are greenhouses where they still maintain today decorative flowers and gardens (on the other side of the Avenue de Montbrun). Some of them wanted to go further in their work of prayer and meditation, namely absolute silence. These were the Bernardines who settled in the area about a kilometre from the Refuge near the greenhouses. Next to the Bernardine convent is the cemetery for Bernardines and the Servants of Mary with more than 300 graves in sand all symmetrically aligned and decorated with a shell cross. This site is unique in France. Each year, they are rebuilt during the season of Lent because the weather erodes them. Nearby there is also a chapel of straw with a sand floor (Our Lady of Solitude), symbol of the greatest austerity of their religious faith. Early in 1870 it was decided to build a racetrack on the sands of Chiberta to develop a new area of recreation and tourism on the current site of La Barre like its neighbour biarrot. This racecourse included fifty hectares of land previously used for the cultivation of vines and some market gardening, while crystallizing a divide between tourism development then reserved for the elite and the peasants, still rooted in the rural world. Its creation was due to a cousin of the mayor of Bayonne, Felix Labat, supported by an Englishman, Lord Howden, a former Spanish ambassador and owner of the Château de Caradoc in Bayonne. The racecourse and shopping places became the most fashionable distraction on the Basque coast. This was the rendezvous of all the "elite" of the time who came to show themselves in the elegant galleries. It was not until 1888 that a new line (BLB) connected Bayonne to Biarritz along the National Route N10 and strengthened the intersection located in the Saint John district. BLB quickly became more attractive than the BAB, especially because of its coverage of Saint John the administrative district and the Marracq High School stop in Bayonne where many students were enrolled from Anglet. In 1884–1885, the first bathing establishment opened its doors on the House of Love beach wishing to compete with the baths in Biarritz. Swimmers had at their disposal: seventy five cabins, a wide assortment of bathing suits, and a swimming coach who personally watched over them. On 9 January 1924 the town was hit by a "tsunami" that destroyed the racetrack (it never succeeded in recovering from this disaster). The bathing establishment, also hit hard, was rebuilt away. It was not until the mid 1920s that the company BALF (Biarritz Anglet Forest) acquired 150 new hectares to create the Chiberta Golf Course (1927). In 1928 a second bathhouse was created at the House of Love, with a saltwater pool, a dozen "cabanas" (cabins with private bathrooms), and a large hall (the whole occupies 15,000 m2). Its art deco style is signed Anatole Durruty. This property attracted the biggest names in high society of the time (the Baroness de Rothschild, the Maharajah of Jasdan, the Grand Duke Dimitri, the King and Queen of Spain, the Prince of Wales, Buster Keaton etc.) and caused a real buzz for the performances, sporting events, galas and world exhibitions. This was the golden age of Anglet. In 1929, the city was classified as a "resort". The three cities, Bayonne, Anglet, and Biarritz agreed to the creation of an airport offering international services which was located two thirds in the commune of Anglet. The VFDM railway line (Voies Ferrées Départementales du Midi) which links Bayonne to Hendaye via la Barre was built from 1913 to 1927 [ ref. desired]. Traversing the woods and countryside Chiberta and overlooking the beaches of the House of Love, the "coast tram" quickly became a tourist line and was also popular with families and local residents. The line closed in 1948 due to a growing disaffection related to the crisis of the 1930s. The chapel of the House of Love, created by Napoleon III became obsolete. Father Sabes was able to mobilize funds from High Society parishioners which allowed him to build a new church, Saint Mary's, in 1932 which became a listed church in 2014 the first historical monument in Anglet.

Postwar, urbanization continued because of the space available and attractive prices, unlike Bayonne or Biarritz. From 1970 to 1980 Anglet absorbed 70% of subdivision projects in the metropolitan area against 10% for Biarritz. The "thirty glorious years" spared no area of the commune, when only a few years past it had farmland, parks, ancient marshes (object of fervour a few centuries earlier). There were real estate programs of all kinds (subdivisions, condominium buildings, shops, industries, business area, highways, 2x2, etc.). Even areas reserved for high society changed in the democratization of holidays and mass tourism. The rural past of the town was relegated to memory. During the 1960s and 70s, the pool of prestigious bathing establishments underwent violent storms that damaged them and eventually lead to their demolition in 1977. The pier was consolidated and the building became a community centre. Today the buildings have been renovated and renamed Space Ocean. Urban planning was done without a large scale organizational plan, torn between two neighbouring communes. It was not until 1972 that the agglomeration created a first instance of intercommunal dialogue and today the urban community of Côte Basque Adour (CAFB).

The inhabitants of the commune are known as Angloys or Angloyes in French, and as Angeluar in Basque.

Winds and Tides was a lively review of poetry in Anglet which was organised by Jeanne Monteil and Jean Léopold Dumontier Béroulet from 1976 to 1992.

Anglet and the neighbouring communes of Biarritz and Bayonne can be seen at different times and through different points of view as either Gascon or Basque. The majority of people in this area spoke Gascon according to the Linguistic Atlas of Gascony (ALG) (1954 1966) and investigations on the limits of the Basque language by Lucien Bonaparte in 1863. At the same time some areas could be described as Basque (no doubt as a result of Basque campaigns in surrounding areas). Since the 20th century the French language has been the majority language.

During the urbanization of the late 19th and early 20th century architecture in Anglet was dominated by a model which took as a reference a Labourd farm, typical of the Basque Country, modelled from Villa Arnaga to Cambo les Bains. This model was called Néobasque. This movement was very popular at the beginning of the 20th century. Another type of architecture, the "chalet" for permanent and popular housing in a commune where the population increased sharply and lost its original rural character. Its purpose was residential and had no connection with what was later called the vacation home. The vacation home is found along the coast, between the Biarritz golf course and Anglet near Chiberta and Chambre d'Amour. These vacation homes had an architectural style called eclecticism. There is no model and each house is influenced by and mixes various styles. Some houses are Moorish style, some are Mediterranean, others Norman style English, and some are unclassifiable. Neo Basque challenged this style of architecture. Around 1930, in the works of the Gomez brothers and architect William Marcel (see the works in the Paulmy Alleys in Bayonne), the model evolved into the "casa torre" which is typical of the neighbouring provinces of Navarre and of Gipuzkoa. The El Hogar home was of this style and was a milestone in the architecture of the time. The house was made for an old Béarn native who made his fortune in Chile and so had a high sensitivity to Hispanic architecture which inspired its architect. William Marcel also designed the new town hall in Anglet in the "New Spanish" style where (1935) is clearly displayed. In 1950, the labourdine neo Basque type house still remains as the predominant model and reference for appreciating a building well integrated into its environment.

The cave of the Chambre d'Amour is part of the heritage of the commune. The Izadia Ecological Park (literary root meaning "the being, the nature" in Basque) was inaugurated in November 2007 in the area of la Barre. It is an urban park of 14 hectares and is one of the last vestiges of a "dune environment" coastline. In this park, one of the ambitious project is the reinstatement of the original species and therefore the removal of endemic species, such as Pampa reeds to cite one example. It includes a lagoon, lakes of brackish water, an expanse of sedge marsh, and marine bulrushes. There are also more arid environments encountered such as heath and Helianthemum sand grass. 200 plant species have been identified. Among them there are 7 heritage species with national, regional or departmental protective statutes: Œillet de France (Dianthus gallicus) is protected at the national level; Bellardie (Bartsia trixago), Maritime Ruppia, and Lotus are protected at the regional level; and Glaux (Lysimachia maritima) and Clypéole (Clypeola jonthiaspi) is protected at departmental level. Finally, there is the iconic Centaurea with dense flowers for which the park is the only known location in France. More than 4700 birds were observed in 2012 of 103 different species. Among these species, 60 are protected including 16 classified in the red list of threatened birds species of France. The Pignada is a forest of 220 hectares representing 10% of the city area. This is the largest green space in the Bayonne Anglet Biarritz agglomeration. The Anglet forestry domain is divided between various pine, pignada (the largest with more than 200 hectares), chiberta (a coastal pine forest which is now urbanized in an upscale subdivision between la Barre and Chambre d'Amour), and the Lazaretto (a pinewood between Blancpignon and Adour). The forest is popularly called the Chiberta Forest. It is an urban forest because it is surrounded on all sides by various suburban districts. It is mostly a pine forest mixed with cork oak, ferns, and other broom. Until the early Middle Ages, the Anglet coastline resembled a sort of "no man's land": a sanded area of dunes and heath so pines were planted to reduce the spread of sand to the interior (planted from 1630 to 1640). Vineyards were once planted on these sands. Napoleon III revived the planting with a grant of 90,000 francs to plant 300 hectares of pine trees. At the beginning of the 20th century, it resembled the Landes mountains. It was exploited for the wood and resin. Of the 450 hectares that had a pine forest in the last century and a half, there remains more than 220 hectares. Montaury Park is located south of the NR10, part of the heart of the city project, is an urban park next to the scientific campus of the University of Pau and Pays de l'Adour. There is exotic vegetation: roses, hydrangeas, palms, and exotic ferns mixed with the existing vegetation of the park. Water is sprayed into basins with intermittent jets. There are children's games and walks. The Latchague Valley in Anglet. Landscaped retention ponds have been made to store rainwater from exceptional rainfall events which can occur each month, 10 years, or 30 years, and to regulate them. This park was created after the floods on the site in 2005. A little over 3 hectares, there is a landscaped path around the edge of the water from the Rue Latchague to the Rue Bahinos. In its prize list of 2012, the National Council of Cities and Villages in Bloom of France awarded four flowers to the commune in the Contest of cities and villages in bloom.

The town has many public kindergartens (Camiade, Jules Ferry, Aristide Briand, Jean Jaurès, Evariste Galois, and Tivoli), two colleges (Endarra college and the private Stella Maris college), two schools (Technological School of Cantau and the Sainte Anne school) and an ikastola (Angeluko ikastola). Furthermore, a Building Institute, an art school and a unit of the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts are present in the commune. Montaury Park hosts disciplines from the University of Pau and Pays de l'Adour such as those dealing with biology, physics, chemistry, logistics, and construction and public works.

In 2010 the commune of Anglet was awarded the label "Internet City @@@@".