CARCASSONNE TO MONTPELLIER,
94¼ MILES
(152 KILOMETRES)
DISTANCES ALONG THE ROUTE
Kil. Miles.
=Carcassonne= to Capendu =18= 11¼
=Capendu= to Lézignan =17= 10½
=Lézignan= to Narbonne =22= 13½
=Narbonne= to Coursan =7= 4½
=Coursan= to Béziers =18= 11¼
=Béziers= to Pézenas =22= 13½
=Pézenas= to Mèze =18= 11¼
[=Béziers= to Mèze by Agde =42= 26]
=Mèze= to Montpellier =30= 18½
NOTES FOR DRIVERS
Practically a level road as far as =Béziers=; after that hilly to
=Mèze=.
PLACES OF INTEREST ON THE ROUTE
=Carcassonne.=--A dual town: the ancient one, generally called La
Cité, is the most perfectly preserved medieval walled city in
France; fifty-four towers in the walls and castle; Cathedral of St.
Nazaire, twelfth to fourteenth century--a lovely building; one of
the bridges across the Aude medieval also. Modern town founded in
thirteenth century; churches of--(1) St. Michael, now the
cathedral, and (2) St. Vincent, fourteenth century.
=Barbaira.=--A village with ruined château.
=Moux.=--Is not interesting.
=Lézignan.=--A small commonplace town; church, fourteenth century.
=Narbonne.=--A large town, with great wine business; Roman remains in
museum; Cathedral of St. Just, an enormous unfinished building,
consisting of a thirteenth-century choir, a fragmentary nave,
chapter-house, and cloisters; Archbishop’s Palace, now the Hôtel de
Ville, has fourteenth-century towers; the museum is in the
Benedictine house of Lamourguier; churches of--(1) St. Paul-Serge,
(2) St. Sébastien.
=Coursan.=--A small town, with busy wine trade; bridge of fifteenth
century.
=Béziers.=--An important town; the centre of the wine trade of the
Midi; stands on raised plateau above the Orb; thirteenth-century
bridge; aqueduct of the Midi Canal, and churches of--(1) St.
Nazaire, (2) St. Jacques, (3) La Madelaine, (4) St. Aphrodise.
=Pézenas.=--A small town, with fifteenth-century gateway and several
old houses.
=Montagnac.=--A dreary little town in a pleasant, hilly country.
=Mèze.=--A town on the Etang-de-Thau; fourteenth-century church of no
interest.
=Gigean.=--An uninteresting village.
Carcassonne was for a long period a dual town, and even to-day, when the
original city is mainly an historical monument, it contains a
considerable
[Illustration: TOWN PLAN NO. 17.--CARCASSONNE.]
number of people within its ancient walls. A glance at the plan will
reveal the position and relative sizes of the two towns, and it need
scarcely be stated that the original city is the one standing on a
raised site east of the river. Because of the great antiquity of the
“Cité,” the large town beneath it is too often regarded as a mushroom
growth. It was, however, founded in the thirteenth century by the people
of the original Carcassonne,
[Illustration: THE PYRENEES IN SPRING.
Seen from a gorse-covered common near Pamiers.]
who, according to some writers, were condemned to leave the town by St.
Louis (IX.) for having supported Raymond Trencavel, the last Vicomte of
Carcassonne, in his unsuccessful efforts to regain the city which his
father had lost. The new town was called the Ville Basse, and its
position being more suited for commercial expansion than the feudal one,
it took a comparatively short time to outgrow the ancient Cité. Being
entirely separated from each other by the River Aude, the growth of the
new town did not mean the disappearance of the old, as at Tours and
Périgueux, and thus in the twentieth century it is possible to see a
practically perfect medieval city, completely encompassed by massive
tower-studded walls. Within them the beautiful Church of St. Nazaire,
the former cathedral, still stands; the castle also remains in complete
preservation, and probably a resurrected townsman of the thirteenth
century would find his way through the streets and along the defensive
walls without the smallest difficulty.
The story of the Cité is told in its walls, for the lower portion
belongs to the Roman occupation in the fourth century. Immediately above
comes the different work of the Visigoths, into whose sinewy hands the
place fell when the Gallo-Roman power had weakened. In 713 the
conquering Saracens took the place of the Visigoths, but Pepin-le-Bref,
the founder of the vast Frankish Empire over which his son Charlemagne
was to reign, drove out the Mohammedans in 759.
Great building activity took place in the eleventh and twelfth centuries
under the powerful dynasty of the Vicomtes Trencavel, which was only
terminated by Simon de Montfort (father of the leader of the English
barons), who, by treachery, was enabled to seize the young Vicomte,
Raymond Roger, during the fierce fighting in the Albigensian War.[I]
As already mentioned, the efforts of Raymond Roger’s son to recover
Carcassonne led to the founding of the new town, which outgrew the
ancient city, which has now become a source of revenue as an attraction
to visitors from all parts of the world.
The restoration of the Cité was carried out by Viollet-le-Duc with that
thoroughness which characterizes the archæological undertakings of the
French, and in the buildings-up and pullings-down
[Illustration: ON THE RAMPARTS OF THE CITÉ OF CARCASSONNE.
One of the most complete medieval towns in the world.]
one feels that more regard for the marks of time and less speculative
roof-making would have preserved the spirit of antiquity, which, it must
in candour be admitted, has been destroyed in the enthusiasm for
reconstruction. When this fact has been recognized and the first
disappointment has gone, the Cité becomes, as it cannot fail to do, one
of the most thrilling of medieval survivals. There is a continuous
double line of walls from 50 to 60 feet in height, made strikingly
picturesque with no less than forty-eight towers. Several of these are
the work of the Visigoth successors of Alaric, and merely to gaze upon
them for a few moments in making the circuit of the walls with the guide
gives one a more real and true impression of what the invasion of Gaul
really meant than one gets from reading the sketchy account of those
times which is all the smaller histories supply. Six more towers make
the three inner sides of the castle formidable. The Porte Narbonnaise,
on the east side of the Cité, was built by Philippe le Hardi, who
continued to strengthen the defences of Carcassonne until his death at
Perpignan in 1285.
The Church of St. Nazaire is a building of exceptional charm and beauty,
the choir and transepts being regarded as the most perfect example of
thirteenth-century work in the South of France. They were added during
the reign of St. Louis, to whose generosity the church was deeply
indebted. The Romanesque nave dates from about 1100, when an earlier one
was rebuilt. In the south aisle a most remarkable bas-relief is let into
the wall. The subject is the Siege of Toulouse in 1218, when Simon de
Montfort was killed. There are some exceedingly interesting effigies and
tombs of early bishops, and that of Simon Vigorce, Archbishop of
Narbonne, who died in 1575. The glass ranges from the thirteenth to the
sixteenth century, and some of it is very beautiful.
Good plans of the Cité are sold in the souvenir shop in the main street
leading from the Porte d’Aude, which faces the modern town. The old
bridge across the Aude is an interesting medieval survival, and makes a
good foreground to the first near view of the old city, with its many
towers and conical roofs cutting into the sky-line.
The streets of the later town are all narrow, and as they run at right
angles to one another, the American visitor must almost feel at home.
There are two churches which should not be overlooked. They are St.
Michael’s, now the cathedral, a thirteenth-century building, with a
painted nave, and St. Vincent’s, belonging to the fourteenth century,
with a west portal enriched with statuary.
THE ROAD TO NARBONNE
goes straight out of Carcassonne towards the east, crossing the Pont
Neuf. In fine weather this road is white and dusty, like all the roads
in the South of France, and motor-cars appear as clouds by day and fire
by night.
Looking back on the ancient Carcassonne, the medievalism of the place is
quite fantastic, and exactly what the early school of Italian artists
depicted as backgrounds to their pictures.
For many miles a ridge of arid hills runs parallel to the road on the
south, and the Cevennes appear in the distance to the north.
Barbaira has a ruined castle bearing the Visigoth name of Alaric.
Some of the hamlets have a strong resemblance to the rock villages of
Italy, and it is here that the silvery green foliage of the olive is
first noticed on the journey eastward. Soon after passing Moux the low
hills come close to the road, exposing layers of soft sand between
harder strata, and the soil changes in colour from a light buff to the
deepest orange.
Lézignan has a fourteenth-century church, but is not an interesting
town.
Passing through more arid hills, one reaches the historic cathedral city
of
NARBONNE
[Illustration: No. 16. CARCASSONNE TO MONTPELLIER.]
The continual silting-up of the Aude has converted the _Narbo_ of the
Phœnicians from one of the busiest ports of the Mediterranean into an
inland town, connected with the sea by a canal. The Romans, foreseeing
this danger, deflected part of the River Aude, and thus kept the seaway
to Narbonne open until 1320, when a dyke gave way, and the river
reverted to its earlier course, with the consequent rapid decline of the
town as a port.
[Illustration: THE ARCADED SQUARE OF MIREPOIX.
The pillars of timber have curiously carved gargoyles. (_Page 252._)]
It stands at the southern end of a plain which is a vast vineyard, and
produces great quantities of wine.
The martyr St. Sebastian, whose death took place in 288, was born at
Narbonne, and also the Roman Emperors Carus, Carinus, and Numerian.
Carved stones of the Roman period have been discovered in great
quantities in the city.
The Cathedral of St. Just was begun in 1272 on a most ambitious scale,
but the choir alone
[Illustration: TOWN PLAN NO. 18.--NARBONNE.]
came into being. Had the great undertaking been completed, Narbonne
would have possessed one of the vastest cathedrals in France. As it
stands to-day, the choir, with its two towers of the fifteenth
[Illustration: NARBONNE.
A picturesque town in Southern France.]
century, rises up above the roofs of the city, after the fashion of
Chartres. In the eighteenth century an effort was made to complete the
nave, but the unfinished masonry in front of the west end of the choir
is all that was accomplished. The swing-doors lead into what might be
called a ‘narthex,’ which is without windows, and the darkness is
profound until one has stumbled cautiously into one of the aisles. There
are fourteenth-century windows in the apse, and round the sanctuary are
some interesting tombs, including those of Cardinal Briçonnet, Prime
Minister under Charles VIII., and La Borde, President and General
Treasurer of France (1607).
Over the door to the sacristy there are magnificent tapestries of the
early Renaissance, and one should see the beautifully vaulted roof of
the fifteenth-century chapter-house.
The Archbishop’s Palace is a huge fortified building, joined to the
cathedral by a mutilated cloister. A portion of the palace has been
adapted as the Hôtel de Ville, the new work by Viollet-le-Duc being in
the style of the thirteenth century. The large turreted tower was built
in 1318, and the central one in 1375.
The museum is in the buildings of what was formerly the Benedictine
Convent of Lamourguier (thirteenth, fourteenth, and eighteenth
centuries). On the same side of the canal--that is, on the opposite side
to the cathedral--is the interesting Church of _St. Paul-Serge_, with a
Romanesque nave, and a choir in the ogee style of Gothic, built early in
the thirteenth century.
North of the cathedral is _St. Sébastien_, a church with fine
fifteenth-century vaulting.
‘At Narbonne have been found “monumental stones” with small caps
carved upon them. When a Roman left in his will that certain of his
slaves should be liberated, a cap was carved upon their tombs, and
so it has become “the cap of liberty,” the symbol of a freedom
greater than the freest Roman ever dreamt of.’ (Mona Caird.)
From Narbonne to Béziers the road crosses the flat alluvial ground to
the little wine town of Coursan, on the Aude, which has a
fifteenth-century bridge. The rest of the way is through a slightly
undulating country, with scarcely more than a village on the road.
BÉZIERS
is one of the busiest centres of the great wine industry of the Midi,
and has been famous for its wines from Roman times until now. It was the
scene of considerable excitement and rioting during
[Illustration: TOWN PLAN NO. 19.--BÉZIERS.]
the crisis in the trade depression of two or three years ago. The site
is a raised plateau, with steep ascents from the River Orb, and during
the feudal period it was a place of great strength, first under its own
lords, and then under the Viscounts of Carcassonne. In the latter period
the town was besieged by Simon de Montfort, and was taken in July, 1209,
a large proportion of the inhabitants being massacred, the lowest
figures of those who perished being given as 20,000. Although Béziers
has a healthy site and a wide, tree-shaded promenade named after
Pierre-Paul Riquet, who was born in the town in 1604, and was the
creator of the Canal du Midi, between Toulouse and Cette, yet the
streets as a whole are narrow, and the atmosphere one breathes in
passing through them is generally very unwholesome.
There is a thirteenth-century bridge of seventeen arches, which should
be seen, and four churches, of which St. Nazaire, formerly the
cathedral, is the most important. It was burnt in the siege of 1209, so
that there are only slight remains of the early building. The transepts
belong to the thirteenth century, and the choir, apse, and nave to the
next. The façade has a fine rose-window, and in the choir the
fourteenth-century windows are protected externally by wrought-iron
grilles. The cloister, also of the fourteenth century, is a beautiful
piece of work.
The other churches are--(1) St. Jacques, with a beautiful
twelfth-century apse: (2) La Madelaine, where many of the townsfolk were
killed in 1209, is a Romanesque building, altered and restored in the
eighteenth century; (3) St. Aphrodise belongs to the twelfth and
fifteenth centuries, and has a Romanesque crypt. The font at the west
end is an early sarcophagus of marble, with a bas-relief, showing two
infuriated beasts in combat.
The Canal du Midi crosses the Orb at Béziers on a big aqueduct, and
considering that it was built as long ago as 1668, it should be looked
upon with the deepest respect. Arthur Young, who was inclined to run
down most of the things he saw in the South of France, grew enthusiastic
over the Canal du Midi. ‘The Canal of Languedoc,’ he says, ‘is the
capital feature of all this country.... Nine sluice-gates let the water
down the hill to join the river at the town--a noble work! The port is
broad enough for four large vessels to lie abreast.... This is the best
sight I have seen in France.’
A fairly hilly country is passed through between Béziers and Pézenas,
but there are no bad gradients on the road.
PÉZENAS
stands in a narrow plain, of such great fertility, owing to the volcanic
properties of the soil, that it is called the Garden of Hérault. It was
a Roman colony, and Pliny mentions the excellence of its woollen stuffs.
A bust of Molière reminds the passer-by that the famous playwright
represented his first works in the town during the winter of 1656, and
that it was here that he wrote ‘Les Précieuses Ridicules.’
A fifteenth-century gateway survives in the town, and there are some
interesting houses of the same and the following centuries.
Leaving Pézenas, one crosses the railway twice, and then goes to the
right for Montagnac, crossing the River Hérault.
Montagnac is a sad-looking town, with gloomy and dirty stuccoed houses;
and one is glad to leave it behind, as one goes through the sunny hills
towards Mèze, having, as one approaches that town, a great panoramic
view over the land-locked Etang-de-Thau, with the Mediterranean showing
beyond Cette. It is in this neighbourhood that one begins to notice the
swords of the cactus, and the olive is seldom absent from the views.
Aleppo pines grow picturesquely here and there, and a solitary cypress
appears now and then.
It is hardly worth while to linger at Mèze, as there is little to see,
and there are many places farther east where the time would be valuable.
There is a pleasant run by the side of the sparkling blue waters of the
Etang, followed by a rather uninteresting stretch of country to
Montpellier, which is entered through a fine avenue of sycamores.