STATIO > TACIONE > TATZO > TAXO
STATIO ad STABULUM ? ...
THE FRAMEWORK OF THE WAYS:
That it is at the roman time or at the medieval time, indeed at the XIX ° century, the ways always have been established on the surest grounds (therefore the firmest), it is to say, roughly, for the territory of Argelès-sur-mer, on a line going from “Taxo d’Avall” to the “Racou” going by the “Tower of Pujols” and the way of Charlemagne (anciently: Cami de las Magnas!). And it is not that at the XX ° century that the (regional) “ Coast Road ” has broken with this logic.
THE TOPONYMY and the ETYMOLOGY:
Examining the cadastre of 1813 and its state of the sections, it has happened to me several times to set in blatant offense of "Frenchification" the surveyors PRESSEQ and VISSEQ and the checking engineer DELPECH (of the "gavatxos" in not to doubt). Thus the Farmhouse Torrenaps – in Catalan : grill-turnips - (become the Farmhouse Tournap), the Farmhouse del Fraire – of the monk - (Farmhouse of the Brother) and, probably "the farmhouse of “anar al riu" - going to the river -, become the Farmhouse Narieu (today the Farmhouse Larrieu). But also and especially TATZO, become TAXO!
On that subject, I wrote in my report in 1994:
Finally, in 1292, quote the CAPBREU of ARGELES.
It is a matter of a constituted document (presently preserved to the Regional Archives) of one series of acts by which the Lawyer (Royal Prosecutor) declares to recognize on behalf of Jacques 1st, King of Majorca, a proprietorship to the chef of family on some grounds. This superb document, ancestor of the cadastre, gives an idea of the names of places and of the names of people in use at this time.
These names are written, not in Latin, but in CATALAN, with (already) some Frenchifications (or "romanisations"?) owed at the feather of the scribe...
Among the names of the places, one raises “SANCTE MARTINI DE TACIONE”, today chapel Saint-Martin of Taxo). Some do not hesitate to make rise the etymology of "Tacione" to the Latin word "statione" (statio). And, when one knows (if one believes the “Way of Antonin”) that it was on the VIA DOMITIA a place of rest, of break (and of toll?) appointed "STATIO AD STABULUM" situated somewhere between ILLIBERIS (ELNE) and EL VOLO (THE BOULOU), the temptation is big of to see in the Latin expression referring to this place the etymological origin of “TATZO d’AVALL.”…
