- Hendaye
French commune|nomcommune=Hendaye
The port at Hendaye
région=Aquitaine
département=Pyrénées-Atlantiques
arrondissement=Bayonne
canton=Hendaye (chief town)
insee=64260
cp=64700
maire=José-Louis Écénarro
mandat=2001 -2008
intercomm=
longitude=-1.77333333333
latitude=43.3594444444
alt moy=25 m
alt mini=0 m
alt maxi=108 m
hectares=795
km²=8
sans=12,596
date-sans=1999
dens=1,584
date-dens=1999Hendaye (Basque "Hendaia") is the most southwesterly town in
France . It is a commune of thePyrénées-Atlantiques "département", on the Atlantic coast, the "Côte Basque", on the right bank of theBidassoa that marks the border withIrún ,Spain .A long sand spit at the river's mouth has made the town a popular seaside tourist resort in the traditional province,
Lapurdi (Labourd), of the French Basque Country.History
On the fortified Île aux Faisans ("Pheasant Isle") in the river, the
Treaty of the Pyrenees was signed in 1659, ending decades of intermittent war between France and Spain. Authority over the Île changes between France and Spain every six months.In 1940,
Ramón Serrano Súñer ,Francisco Franco ,Adolf Hitler andJoachim von Ribbentrop met in the Hendaye railway station (then in German-occupied France) to discuss Spain's participation inWorld War II as part of the Axis. Franco, uneasy about committing his nation to another conflict so soon after theSpanish Civil War , was not convinced, and Hitler decided not to force the issue. Spain was officially neutral during the following five years of the war, though very much a pro-Axis state.ights
The town square, where there is a weekly open-air market on Wednesdays, is the location of the famous
17th century "Great Cross of Hendaye ", a stone cross carved with alchemical symbols that occultists find to contain encrypted information on a future global catastrophe. The church of Saint-Vincent was built in 1598, and largely reconstructed over the centuries following fires and bombardments. Its most recent transformation was finished in 1968. The 13th-century crucifix is the principal treasure.The seafront Château of
Antoine d'Abbadie , built by the architect and theoristEugène Viollet-le-Duc is a monument of theGothic Revival .Transportation
The town is an important
railway junction, as Spain's mainline trains use a broader gauge than continental Europe.Miscellaneous
*Hendaye is
twinned withPeebles , in theScottish Borders
*French authorPierre Loti lived here
*It is the western end of the GR 10 long distance footpath
*It marks the beginning (or end) of the Raid Pyreneen long distance cycle challenge
*Hendaye was the native town ofMartin Guerre , the man at the center of a famous sixteenth-century case of impostureee also
*
Pheasant Island External links
* [http://www.hendaye.com/ Official website] (in French)
* [http://www.euskomedia.org/euskomedia/SAunamendi?idi=en&op=7&voz=HENDAIA HENDAIA in the Bernardo Estornés Lasa - Auñamendi Encyclopedia (Euskomedia Fundazioa)] (in Spanish)
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