The Collected Prose, page 16
If we can identify a single word which would be the key to a dead civilization, like kalos kagathos for the Greeks, and virtus for the Romans, such a word for the South would be paratge, found and declined innumerable times in the troubadours” poems, and meaning honor, integrity, equality, condemnation of brute force, and respect for individuals.
Thus one may say that in the south of what is now France there existed a separate civilization, and that the Albigensian crusade was a clash of two cultures. The defeat of the county of Toulouse is one of the catastrophes of humanity, like the destruction of the Cretan or Mayan civilizations.
The paradox of this civilization consisted in the co-existence of an epicurean lifestyle and passionate love poetry, with the veneration of the Cathars, who offended the Church with their excessive asceticism. To clarify this mystery, scholars suggest that the Lady in the poetry of the troubadours is the symbol of the Cathar Church. A risky thesis to say the least. Nevertheless, research has proved that some troubadours were influenced by the heresy (and by mystical Arab poetry), and that they understood love not as physical passion, but as a method of achieving spiritual and moral perfection.* Languedoc, with Lombardy and Bulgaria, was one of the European countries most affected by the Cathar heresy, whose followers came from all social strata, from peasants to princes. The roots of the popularity of the new religion can be traced to the corruption of the Catholic Church in southern France, to a specific intellectual and emotional situation, and simply to the attractiveness of Catharism. Around 1167 a meeting of Albigensians was held in St-Félix-de Caraman under the leadership of Nicestas, establishing the organization and ritual of the southern Cathar Church.
Naturally the Roman Church felt threatened by the spread of the heresy. One must admit that the first attempts to regain control were through peaceful, intellectual means: joint debates with the Cathars about dogma, numerous apostolic missions by prominent preachers such as St. Bernard of Clairvaux, which ended in failure due to open hostility towards the Church. “The basilicas are without the faithful, the faithful without priests, priests without respect.”
The situation changed when the papal throne fell to thirty-eight-year-old Lotario Conti, who took the name of Innocent III. His face in a fresco in the church of Subiaco emanates peace and strength; but his spiritual rule in Languedoc was ill-judged, to put it mildly, partly because of the inertia of the local clergy, partly because of the officious papal legates. Though morally responsible for the Albigensian crusade, the new Pope was by no means a religious fanatic; his letters are full of a concern with justice and—even taking into account official style—moderate in tone.
The same cannot be said of his special envoy—a Cistercian monk, Pierre de Castelnau6 of the Abbey of Fontfroide, who went to Languedoc charged with suppressing the heresy. He seems to have been a fanatic lacking any political sense, diplomatic talent, and the simplest tact. Nominated as the pope’s envoy with special powers, he was given as his assistant Arnaud Amaury7, Abbot of Citeaux. Their actions produced a chain of misunderstandings and embitterment. Of equally little effect were the fiery sermons of St. Dominic, who got laughter and mockery instead of the crown of martyrdom (“I beg you not to kill me instantly, but to tear my limbs out one by one”). The continuous debates, being a clash of different worlds, traditions, and mentalities, had negligible results. Defenders of the Catholic faith sometimes lost patience, as exemplified by St. Bernard of Verfeil8—“Let God curse you, thick-skinned heretics, among whom I sought in vain even a little subtle intelligence”—or Brother Étienne de Minia, who tried to exclude from philosophical disputes the sister of the Duke of Foix, Esclarmonde9: “Go attend to your spinning-wheel, Lady; it does not become you to have a voice in these matters.”
Finally Pierre de Castelnau reached the conclusion that only force could suppress the heresy. Unable to arrange a coalition of Provençal lords who would move against the heretics under the leadership of Raymond VI, he threw a curse on the Count of Toulouse. “He who would disinherit you will be in the right, and he who would kill you will be blessed.” Such was the conclusion of the mission of the papal emissary who, having nothing more to do, set off back to Rome.
He was murdered by an unknown assassin in Saint-Gilles, at dawn on January 15, 1208. Raymond’s men became the main suspects. The martyr’s blood-stained shirt was carried from castle to castle and town to town in northern France, and the faithful were summoned to a crusade. Raymond VI, seeing the imminent danger, decided to submit to the pope’s will. In June 1209, accompanied by three archbishops, nineteen bishops, dignitaries, vassals, clergy, and laymen, with a bare chest, a rope around his neck, and a candle in his hands, flogged with birch twigs, he walked to the stone lions guarding the portal of the beautiful cathedral in Saint-Gilles. The treaty signed after this ceremony in essence subjected the Duchy to a true dictatorship of the Church. Moreover, Raymond surprised everyone by taking the Cross and joining the army of crusaders then sailing down the Rhône Valley.
The mighty train of men, horses, and iron stretching for kilometers is terrifying to behold. Among the army are Flemish, Normans, Burgundians, Frenchmen, and Germans. They are led by bishops, archbishops, Duke Odo of Burgundy, the dukes of Nevers, Boulogne, and Saint-Pol, renowned barons and knights like Simon de Montfort10 and Guy de Levis11. The rest of the force is composed of sergeants, foot-soldiers, and mercenaries—the terrible, ruthless force known to every medieval army, recruited among cutthroats hungry for blood and loot. The most highly-priced hirelings come from the Basque, Aragonese, and Brabant regions. They are lowly in the military hierarchy, but often a decisive factor in battle. If we add auxiliary units and crowds of pilgrims lured by the hope of pious contemplation of burning stakes, the figure of three hundred thousand provided by chronicles does not seem exaggerated, assuming that the army of knights was but a small fraction of this mass, like the percentage of tanks to infantry in a modern army.
The first of the nobles to meet the crusaders’ swords is the Viscount of Carcassonne, Béziers, and Albi, twenty-five-year-old Raymond-Roger from the Trencavel family. Frightened by the advance of the enemy army, he attempts to negotiate with the pope’s legate. In vain. The heavy war machine, “an army never seen before,” cannot be stopped once put in motion. Raymond-Roger barricades himself in Carcassonne, while the crusaders follow the old Roman road towards Béziers.
The town is situated on a hill over the river Orb. It has solid walls and sufficient food. The Bishop of Béziers tries to negotiate, but the crusaders present a list of two hundred and twenty persons (or families) accused of heresy, and demand their surrender. The town councilors answer with dignity that they would rather be “drowned in the salty sea” than deliver their citizens. The siege begins. On Saint Magdalen day, July 22, before military action commences, matters take a fatal turn for the defenders. A group of burghers, encouraged by the passivity of the huge army, leaves the city walls with “great white banners, and runs forward until out of breath, hoping to frighten the enemy away, like a flock of sparrows from a stand of oats.” “Immense imprudence,” because the army of mercenaries immediately leaps to its feet.
They are barefooted, armed with clubs and knives, dressed only in shirts and trousers, but their thirst for blood is inexhaustible. They manage to break into the town following the members of the rash expedition. Once inside, they spread indescribable terror; the assault on the walls takes only a few hours. A crowd of survivors gathers in Saint Nazaire Cathedral, and in the churches of Saint Magdalen and Saint Jude. The soldiery break down the doors and slaughter everyone: the new-born, women, cripples, elders, and priests celebrating mass. Bells toll for the dead. The annihilation is total.
Pierre de Vaux-de-Cernay, a Cistercian monk and chronicler of the expedition against the Albigensians, wrote that in St. Magdalen alone seven thousand people were killed, which is probably an exaggeration. Historians estimate, however, that some thirty thousand (innocent) people were killed in Béziers. What makes this figure even more terrifying is that inhabitants were put to the sword without discrimination. The papal legate, Arnaud Amaury, when asked during the battle what was to be done with the Catholics who must have been among those massacred, said: “Kill everyone. God will recognize his own.” This famous response is probably apocryphal, since it is quoted by a fourteenth-century chronicler, Caesarius of Heisterbach. It is likely that Arnaud Amaury—a blockhead rather than a cynic—uttered only the first sentence. Nevertheless, this dictum provides an excellent commentary on the events.
As a result of the quarrel between the mercenaries and the regular army over the division of spoils, the town was set on fire “together with the cathedral built by Master Gervaise12, which split in half with a great noise in the heat of the flames, and fell into two parts.” With flying banners the crusaders turned towards the walls of Carcassonne, a city of thirty spires sheltering Viscount Raymond-Roger.
The Carcassonne of today, reconstructed by Viollet-le-Duc13, gives only a faint notion of the fortress that it was, surrounded by a double wall. The first feature which strikes a visitor is the small space between the walls, about ten thousand square meters. In August 1209 the city offered asylum to tens of thousands of people, not counting cattle and horses. Despite that fact, the battle was fierce, and the young Raymond-Roger conducted it with the talent and bravura of an experienced commander. The hot summer became an ally of the crusaders. A dark cloud of flies and the odor of pestilence hung over Carcassonne. Lack of water forced the defenders to capitulate after a fortnight’s siege.
The events that followed provoke controversies among scholars, and the reports of Guillaume de Tudèle14 and Guillaume de Puylaurens15 are full of insinuations, but do not cast enough light on this vastly important episode. No agreement is signed between the crusaders and Raymond-Roger, and worse still, in a violation of the knightly code of honor, the Viscount is imprisoned and dies soon after of dysentery. The pope’s envoy presses for the election of his successor from among the senior French crusaders, in flagrant violation of feudal law, especially as Raymond-Roger’s four-year-old son is alive. Magnanimously, the French lords and counts refuse the title and inheritance after his tragic death. “There was no one who would not feel it was a loss of honor to accept the land,” says Guillaume de Tudèle.
Then enters a man whose figure would cast an ominous shadow on Provence and Languedoc for many years: Simon de Montfort. He has long been remembered as the symbol of a warrior who, accompanied by a handful of loyal men, could shake the foundations of an empire. He was a prototypical conquistador—a fanatic, whose horizons were limited by his military helmet, a man with a strong arm, ambitious, energetic, exceedingly talented as a commander: a perfect candidate to be Viscount of Carcassonne and Béziers. In addition, he had distinguished himself in the Fourth Crusade and was a direct vassal of the King of France.
The fall of Carcassonne opened the gates of many castles for Montfort, but the forty days for which the crusaders were pledged to fight the heretics came to an end, and the warriors departed to the north. Simon de Montfort remained, with a contingent of about twenty-six knights. Of course during the eight years of constant struggle “the lion of the crusades” received reinforcements. The country was terrorized, but by no means conquered.
In June 1210, Montfort besieged Minerve, a city situated between Carcassonne and Béziers among deep gorges and a deserted countryside. The fortress was defended bravely, but a siege-machine destroyed the castle’s water supply system, and the defenders were forced to negotiate. According to accepted practice, heretics who renounced their faith would be spared. One of Montfort’s captains, Robert de Mauvoisin, protested. He had come to destroy heresy, not to show indulgence. Arnaud Amaury consoled him: “Rest assured, sir, few will be converted.” He was right. The first great pyre in the conquered city consumed one hundred and fifty men and women, who “died with courage worthy of a better cause,” as the Benedictine Dom Vaissete16 commented sadly.
The war had long ceased to be an expedition against heretics, and had become a great battle between the North and the South, a war of nations; however many castles Montfort captured, the country was not conquered. Noblemen waited in their eagles’ nests for the right moment, towns rebelled, and French garrisons placed in captured fortresses were often wiped out. Sieges grew longer and harder. Béziers fell in a few hours; it took fifteen days to conquer Carcassonne, and Minerve only surrendered after six weeks.
The fortress of Termes was besieged by the crusaders for four months. The castle’s position was perfect. In order to approach it, one had to “jump into a precipice, then, so to speak, crawl towards the sky.” The army besieging Termes was demoralized, reduced to half its original size, and starved. After three difficult months of siege the bishops accompanying Montfort are ready to abandon him. The “lion of the crusades” begs them to stay two more days. On the evening of the next day, the commander of the fortress declared his willingness to negotiate. The cisterns in the town had dried up; once again water proved the crusaders’ ally. But at night there was a downpour, and Raymond, the leader of the garrison, shut himself up in the fortress. The ensuing battle was fierce and rich in dramatic episodes. Montfort’s chaplain was killed during mass, and his closest companion, with whom he used to walk arm-in-arm, was beheaded by a stone-throwing machine. Montfort was broken. He contemplated ending the siege and entering a monastery. One day the fortress fell silent, and the crusaders discovered to their amazement that it was empty. This time rats defeated the besieged: during the dry weather they got into the cisterns and poisoned the water.
The war draws closer to the countries of Toulouse and Foix. According to a methodical plan of conquest, the crusaders besiege Lavaur. It is defended by Aimery de Montréal, a former ally of Montfort and a son of Blanche de Laurac, a famous “perfected one.” The lady is also known for her loyalty to the Cathar Church and her charitable works. The walls of Lavaur fall after a heroic defense lasting over two months. The commander and eighty knights are hanged. A hastily-built scaffold collapses under their weight, and henchmen have to finish off victims by cutting their throats. The Countess is thrown into a well and stoned. A gigantic stake, the largest of the war, devours four hundred Albigensians, who step into the flames singing “cum ingenio gaudio.”
The inevitable confrontation with the Count of Toulouse draws nearer, since the crusaders have no doubt that Raymond is an unreliable ally. The latter does everything to save his lands from war, but the resistance of the pope’s legate cannot be broken. Montfort besieges the heart of the country, the capital of Languedoc, Toulouse; but suddenly he himself is surrounded at Castelnaudary. A bloody yet indecisive battle is fought under the town walls.
Montfort’s ambitions disturb the Pope, who even temporarily suspends the crusade and grants the title of Duke of Narbonne to his envoy, Arnaud Amaury—thus starting a lasting feud between two men who had so far worked hand-in-hand.
At this point the King of Aragon enters the war game: Pedro II, connected by feudal ties with Languedoc, the brother-in-law of the Duke of Toulouse and former leader of the crusade against the Spanish Moslems, the conqueror of Las Navas de Tolosa17. For some time, though to little avail, he had tried to play the role of mediator between his neighbors and the French; now, relying on his military glory, he attempts to explain to the Pope that a war against heretics has turned into a barbarian conquest and colonization of a Christian country.
When his arguments yield no result, Pedro II in September 1213 crosses the Pyrenees with the finest knights of Aragon and Catalonia and joins Raymond VI. The proportion of knights is 900 to 2000, to Montfort’s disadvantage, when both armies prepare for battle near the town of Muret. In a council of war, Raymond proposes to wait for an attack, then launch a counter-attack and push the enemy back to the castle, where it would soon have to capitulate. This sane plan seems insufficiently picturesque and knightly to the Spaniards. Meanwhile Montfort falls upon the Aragonese with Napoleonic speed and bravura, and the armies come together in a deadly embrace. “It sounded as though a huge forest were falling under ax-blows.” Pedro II, a thirty-nine-year-old warrior with the strength of a tiger, does not command the fight, but is at the center of the chaos which constituted a medieval battle. After a bitter fight he is killed; news of their king’s death spreads panic among the army. A sudden attack by Montfort from the flank disperses his enemies, among them the Count of Toulouse’s army, which did not even have the chance to enter the battle. The infantry of Languedoc, already storming the walls of Muret, is decimated; up to twenty thousand men disappear in the quick current of the Garonne. A year and a half later, without losing a single soldier, Montfort enters Toulouse, the Rome of the Cathars. Raymond VI and his son seek asylum at the court of the King of England.
Montfort becomes the lord of a country larger than the domain of the King of France. The fate of Languedoc seems to be sealed, but in effect the leader has only as much land as French soldiers are able to defend.
On July 16, 1216, Pope Innocent III dies, and nineteen-year-old Raymond VII lands in Marseille, enthusiastically welcomed by the population. He immediately besieges Beaucaire and forces Simon de Montfort’s brother to surrender. The inhabitants of Toulouse build barricades and drive out the French. Raymond VI, marching through the Pyrenees with an Aragonese army, enters his capital, welcomed with tears of joy. Defeated for the first time, Montfort besieges the city in vain, despite reinforcements. The humiliated “lion of the crusades” is a different man now, and a cardinal-legate, Bertrand, complains that the great warrior is stricken with a sudden inertia, “asking God only to give him peace and to relieve him by death from so many sufferings.” In the ninth month of the siege, during a morning raid by the Toulousians, Simon’s brother Guy de Montfort is wounded. As the commander runs from a tent where he has been hearing mass, a huge stone from a catapult strikes the Duke’s steel helmet, “so mighty a blow it crushed his eyes, his brain, his teeth, his brow and his jaws. And he fell to the ground, dead, bloodied, and black.”
