The approach to Arouille brought the army out of the Landes and into the territory of the count of Armagnac. With this came a change of terrain as the flat, forested landscape gave way to more open and undulating countryside intersected by small rivers and streams. It seems that the village of Vielle-Soubiran received the first hostile visitation from the Anglo-Gascon army, but it was at Arouille, four miles further south, that the first hostilities were recorded by Baker.

We know little of Arouille other than that it was a bastide town founded by King Edward I and the viscount of Juliac in 1295. Over its life it has diminished in size and importance, to the extent that in 1965 it ceased to be a commune in its own right and was absorbed into the nearby town of St-Justin. All that remains now is a small hamlet with a cluster of houses. However, as a bastide town Arouille would have had much in common with similar new towns which have survived in south-west France. There would have been both economic and political motives for its foundation.