Record Atlas
7 eras · 1191–2026 · 1 places

French Basque Country - Labourd, Lower Navarre and Soule

Bayonne, Biarritz, Saint-Jean-de-Luz, Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, Mauléon. Which empire held this ground in which years — and, the part that matters, which archive that means.

Whose archive this ground was

YearsWho held itWhose archive that means
1191–1451 Labourd under the Angevin dukes of Aquitaine; Lower Navarre in the Kingdom of Navarre no registers survive

Labourd was disputed by the Angevin dukes of Aquitaine until 1191, when it stayed under Angevin sovereignty while Lower Navarre went to Navarre. Bayonne separated from Labourd in 1215 and was ruled by its own council.
1451–1512 Labourd and Soule in the French crown; Lower Navarre in Navarre Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

Labourd and Soule passed to the French crown with the conquests of Mauléon (1449) and Bayonne (1451), and after the Hundred Years' War were autonomous provinces (pays d'état).
1512–1620 Lower Navarre - the Kingdom of Navarre north of the Pyrenees Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

Ferdinand II of Aragon conquered the southern part of Navarre in 1512, leaving Lower Navarre as the northern remnant. Henry III of Navarre became Henry IV of France in 1589, and the two crowns remained formally separate until 1620 (some sources say 1620-24).
1620–1790 Kingdom of France - Labourd, Lower Navarre and Soule Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

Navarre merged into the Kingdom of France in 1620. The three provinces kept their own institutions until the Revolution.
1790–1940 France - Basses-Pyrénées department Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

The department of Basses-Pyrénées was created on 4 March 1790 from Labourd, Soule, Lower Navarre and Béarn, so the Basque provinces are filed together with Béarn. Civil registration passed to the municipalities by the decree of 20 September 1792.
1940–1945 German-occupied France - the demarcation line Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

The line created by the armistice of 22 June 1940 ran down to the Spanish border past Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, crossing the Basses-Pyrénées; coastal areas were closed from April 1941.
1945–2026 France - Pyrénées-Atlantiques Archives départementales des Pyrénées-Atlantiques · FamilySearch · Geneanet

The department became part of the Aquitaine region in the 1950s, and Aquitaine merged into Nouvelle-Aquitaine on 1 January 2016.

The rings are approximate — deliberately. They exist to shade which filing system a place fell under, not to adjudicate a border. A place near a ring's edge should be checked against both neighbours.

See the whole span, 1191–2026, on the map →

The map takes a range, and a range that crosses one of the rows above is where records get lost: the family never moved, and the archive on the far side of the handover will tell you it holds nothing.

1 places on this ground

118 FamilySearch collections reach this ground

Ranked with the regional ones first — a collection for a province is usually a better lead than a national index, though the national index is often where a name is actually written down. A free account opens the images.

…and 58 more.

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