Lagamas

Lagamas
Commune
The town hall
Coat of arms
Location of Lagamas
Lagamas Show map of France Lagamas Show map of Occitanie
Coordinates: 43°40′29″N 3°31′26″E / 43.6747°N 3.5239°E / 43.6747; 3.5239
Country	France
Region	Occitania
Department	Hérault
Arrondissement	Lodève
Canton	Gignac
Intercommunality	Vallée de l'Hérault
Government
• Mayor (2020–2026)	Christian Viloing^[1]
Area ¹	4.52 km² (1.75 sq mi)
Population (2021)^[2]	110
• Density	24/km² (63/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
INSEE/Postal code	34125 /34150
Elevation	33–142 m (108–466 ft) (avg. 40 m or 130 ft)
¹ French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km² (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries.

Lagamas (Occitan: L'Agamàs) is a commune in the Hérault département in the Occitanie region in southern France.

Geography

This commune is located in the Languedoc-Roussillon region, in the Hérault département, in the canton of Gignac. The village is part of the 4th constituency of Hérault.

Climate

In 2020, Météo-France published a typology of climates in mainland France in which the commune is exposed to a Mediterranean climate and is in the Provence, Languedoc-Roussillon climatic region, characterised by low rainfall in summer, very good sunshine (2,600 h/year), a hot summer 21.5 °C (71 °F), very dry air in summer, dry in all seasons, strong winds (frequency of 40 to 50% of winds > 5 m/s) and little fog.^[3]

For the period 1971-2000, the average annual temperature was 14.3 °C (58 °F) with an annual temperature range of 16.5 °C (62 °F). The average annual total rainfall is 849 mm, with 6.8 days of precipitation in January and 3.1 days in July. For the period 1991-2020, the average annual temperature observed at the nearest weather station, located in the commune of Saint-André-de-Sangonis, 3 km away as the crow flies,^[4] is 15.5 °C (60 °F) and the average annual total rainfall is 652.4 mm.^[5]^[6] For the future, climate parameters for the municipality estimated for 2050 according to different greenhouse gas emission scenarios can be consulted on a dedicated website published by Météo-France in November 2022.^[Map 1]

Urbanism

Land use

The commune's land use, as revealed by the European biophysical land cover database Corine Land Cover (CLC), is characterised by the importance of agricultural land (96.9% in 2018), an increase compared to 1990 (77%). The detailed breakdown in 2018 is as follows: permanent crops (56.5%), heterogeneous agricultural areas (40.4%), forests (3%).^[7] Changes in land use in the municipality and its infrastructure can be seen on various maps of the area: the Cassini map (eighteenth century), the carte d'état-major (1820-1866) and IGN maps or aerial photos for the current period (1950 to the present).

Population

Changes in the number of inhabitants are known from population censuses carried out in the commune since 1793. For communes with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants, a census of the entire population is carried out every five years, with the legal populations for the intervening years estimated by interpolation or extrapolation.^[8] For the commune, the first exhaustive census under the new system was carried out in 2005.^[9]

In 2021, the commune had a population of 110,^[a] unchanged from 2015 (Hérault: +7.29%, France excluding Mayotte: +1.84%).

Historical population

Year	Pop.	±% p.a.
1793	60	—
1800	72	+2.64%
1806	67	−1.19%
1821	120	+3.96%
1831	63	−6.24%
1836	68	+1.54%
1841	78	+2.78%
1846	70	−2.14%
1851	71	+0.28%
1856	78	+1.90%
1861	70	−2.14%
1866	87	+4.44%
1872	66	−4.50%
1876	73	+2.55%
1881	71	−0.55%
1886	59	−3.64%
1891	60	+0.34%
1896	70	+3.13%
1901	71	+0.28%
1906	65	−1.75%

Year	Pop.	±% p.a.
1911	64	−0.31%
1921	74	+1.46%
1926	73	−0.27%
1931	78	+1.33%
1936	65	−3.58%
1946	41	−4.50%
1954	62	+5.31%
1962	61	−0.20%
1968	46	−4.59%
1975	43	−0.96%
1982	56	+3.85%
1990	71	+3.01%
1999	111	+5.09%
2005	113	+0.30%
2006	121	+7.08%
2010	114	−1.48%
2015	110	−0.71%
2020	111	+0.18%
2021	110	−0.90%

Source: EHESS^[10] and INSEE (1968–2017)^[11]

Architecture

The church, Notre-Dame de la Garrigue, was built by Élodie Martin, the widow of the textile magnate Jean-Pierre Balsan as a homage to her husband. The Balsan family is known to have inhabited Lagamas since at least 1576. The church, with its unusual gothic style, is a miniature inspired by the Châteauroux cathedral, a city where the Balsan family had acquired the Manufacture Royale de Drap de Châteauroux in 1856.

The church was completed in around 1874.^[12] An extensive renovation was finalised in 2007.

The same widow built the large mansion facing the church, known locally as the château. It hosts an annual multi-disciplinary artist residency organised by the Cornelius Arts Foundation.

Notes

^ Legal municipal population in effect as of January 1, 2024, dated 2021, defined within the territorial boundaries in effect as of January 1, 2023, statistical reference date: January 1, 2021.