Travel Guide Oraas

With its two very old hamlets, this village is marked by history. The Château du Leu still retains traces of fortifications with its fortified enclosure and drawbridge. The sculpted coat of arms of Pierre de Saint-Macary, lord of the place and magistrate of the parliament of Pau, are still clearly visible. The hamlet of By, i. e. the wine in Béarnais, has a special chapel. The Gothic church, made of pebbles, retains a narrow gate called the Gate of the Cagots after the passage of a community of these crestians settled in the village. Two old bells animate the bell tower, one, Marie, from 1770 from the old church of Mur (Castagnède), and the other, more modern, from 1951, donated by Cécile Sorel, Countess of Ségur and member of the Comédie-Française. Inside, we discover a 14th century Chrism, completely unknown and absent from the inventory made in 1970. Economic activity is mainly oriented towards agriculture. The subsoil contains a rock salt deposit that has been exploited since the 19th century. Thus, since the closure of the Salies-de-Béarn salt fountain, it is the Queen Jeanne d'Oraàs spring that supplies the Salies Salt Works. Thanks to an eight-kilometre pipeline, Oraàs has been supplying water and salt to the Baths and Bayonne Ham for more than a century. History!