- Laires
French commune
name= Laires
region=
departement=
arrondissement=
canton= Fauquembergues
insee=62485
cp=62960
maire=Bernadette Franche
mandat=
intercomm=Communauté de communes du Canton de Fauquembergues
longitude=2.25638888889
latitude=50.5411111111
alt moy=182 m
alt mini=140 m
alt maxi=190 m
hectares=864
km²=8,64
sans=297
date-sans=1999
dens=34|Laires is a commune in the
Pas-de-Calais "département" in theNord-Pas-de-Calais region ofFrance .Geography
A village situated 15 miles (24km) south of
Saint-Omer , on the D95 road.Population
History
In 734, Laires was called "Wilbert", after its owner. The spelling of the name has changed over the centuries from Larae, Laris, Lares, Laire and Lare, to become Laires by the eighteenth century. In 1115,
Baldwin VII, Count of Flanders , made a gift of the village to the abbey of St Saviour at Ham. In January 1478, a band of soldiers from theBurgundian garrison atRenescure terrorized the area around Laires and instead of helping people to fight the "French enemy", looted the village. Against the Spanish, the commune suffered again. In 1537 the area was completely devastated. In 1542 and 1543, the village was looted several times and fourteen French houses were burned down.Places of interest
* The church of St.Martin, dating from the 15th century.
* The war memorial, from 1921.See also
Communes of the Pas-de-Calais department External links
* [http://www.recensement.insee.fr/RP99/rp99/co_navigation.co_page?nivgeo=C&codgeo=62485&theme=ALL&typeprod=ALL&lang=FR&quelcas=LISTE Laires on the Insee website] fr
* [http://www.quid.fr/communes.html?mode=detail&id=26974&req=Laires Laires on the Quid website] frNotes
*"This article is based on the equivalent article from the
French Wikipedia , consulted on May 14th 2008."
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