Master

Commune of Ussat
Altitude: 468 m
Location: near Tarascon-sur-Ariège
Number of inhabitants: 317
Distances: Tarascon-sur-Ariège 3 km - Les Cabannes 11 km
Ussat, formerly called Ussat-le-Vieux, is a village separated by the commune of Ornolac and Tarascon. However, the village of Ussat differs from that of Ornolac-Ussat-les-Bains, further on, because if the latter is mainly known for its spa center, Ussat has a more cultural heritage such as its stalactite cave, its Saint -Jean Baptiste and its small medieval centre.
The caves located above the village are rich in vestiges of the Magdalenian eras and the Bronze Age and two of them are fortified caves, castle-barracks of the Counts of Foix in the Middle Ages.
On the other side of Ariège, the Lombrives cave also contained remains and burials from the Middle Bronze to the Late Bronze Age (-1500 to -800). It served as a refuge for counterfeiters in 1300: caught, they were released because they admitted to having been incapable of making currency sufficiently correct for it to be used! Ussat is a small community at the end of the Middle Ages: there were only 10 taxable households there in the XNUMXth century and it shared its priest with that of Ornolac. An ancient village, Ussat was made up of two towns. As in the Ornolac valley, Ussat-le-Vieux was located high up while the village at the bottom of the valley is the most recent. Ussat is mentioned from the beginning of the XNUMXth century and we know that these villages on the slopes were in place before the year XNUMX. The Saint-Martin church was located in the middle of the valley, near the cemetery and was moved when the village below grew. The size of the community and its proximity to the large town of Tarascon meant that it was very early associated at the Tarascon consulate.
Town hall opening hours: Monday, Tuesday and Friday: 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 13:30 p.m. to 17 p.m.