Carcassonne The Fortified Town 🇫🇷 France

Carcassonne is located in the heart of the triangle formed by the cities of Toulouse, Montpellier and Barcelona at the crossroads of two major traffic roads dating back to ancient times. From the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, from the Savin to the Pyrenees mountain range, and the source of the Aude river, Carcassonne blooms in the plains of the lower valley. The walled city of Carcassonne is known first and foremost as a fortified medieval town, but this rocky outcrop has been inhabited by humans since the 6th century BC. First settled by the ancient Gauls, it was the Romans who began to construct the town's first ramparts as early as the 3rd and 4th centuries AD. Fortification works lasted until the end of the 13th century with the construction of the outer wall and the modernization of the inner rampart, turning this town into an impregnable fortress. The extraordinary site of the medieval fortress has remained virtually unchanged over the centuries, an appearance that betrays the town's rich history. Imposing, impregnable and perfectly preserved with massive stone ramparts, towers and barbicans adding to its authority, the town dominates a vast area from its hilltop position. With 52 towers and two concentric enclosures, Carcassonne is encircled by more than three kilometers of ramparts. The bridge leading over the ditch from the barbican to the twin tower entry was partially reconstructed in the 19th century. Three different bridges multiplied the obstacles assailants would meet when coming from the town. First a drawbridge, then a small stone bridge and finally a wooden bridge. Here is the castle's eastern gate in the Kazan tower with its curtain walls from which the city could be defended. Due to its position at the intersection of historical routes crossing France, the site of Carcassonne has been occupied for more than 5,000 years and had already become an important center 2,500 years ago. It was first fortified by the Romans who gave it the name Carcassonne. The Romans were driven out by various invading tribes who subsequently further fortified and developed the city. The town subsequently gained strategic importance because of its location on the frontier between France and Spain. After 1659 when the Treaty of the Pyrenees passed the town and region definitively to France, this location became less important as did the need for a fortified city. The castle is comprised of two buildings dominated by a square keep. The main courtyard in the Truncavelle's first castle includes several towers. The hoarding is a wooden gallery overhanging the top of the castle walls. From the main courtyard a covered passage leads to a second courtyard. The ground and walls of the southern courtyard bear traces indicating the size of the stateroom of the Senate of the King of France added in the 13th or 14th century. Since 1927 the medieval rooms of the castle which had been renovated at different points in the past in order to house military garrisons have been home to a collection of sculptures from buildings in Carcassonne and the surrounding area. Alabaster objects from the early 15th century illustrate three episodes from the Passion of Christ. They come from a decorative screen from one of Carcassonne's churches now destroyed. From the top of the castle's roof one can see the castle's medieval military architecture with its cernulated walls, the first obstacle assailants would meet when attacking the The masonry in parts of the castle is a rough construction of yellowish sandstone blocks. The Visigothic towers, partly destroyed in battles throughout the centuries, were consolidated and raised in height. This consolidation work was undertaken before the crusades against the Cathars began in 1209. The towers project from the fortified wall commanding it and thus making possible more flexible system of defense. The inner wall is 1,286 meters long and has 25 towers. The outer wall with 17 towers measures 1,500 meters in length. Here is a section of the inner wall between the castle and the old gate. The stone bridge that replaced a medieval structure that had been built upstream where the Roman bridge stood dates to the early 14th century. The 12 full center arches of the Carcassonne bridge have opening diameters of unequal lengths ranging from 10 to 14 meters. The old gate, the main entrance to the fortified city or bastide, is situated on the wall's west face close to the castle. Cut into the wall like the Rodé gate to the north, it is armed with a bardisson or overhanging wall-mounted turret. Its defense is completed by a military system composed of an outer gate reached by a covered passage protected by merlins. The Rodé or Burg gate was constructed in the curtain wall that connects the Macquarie and Samson towers. The arrow slits created in these towers ancient bays at the end of the 13th century ensured flanking fire and the defense of the medieval gate. The Narbonne gate is the entrance to the eastern side of the fortified town. Its tall twin towers are reinforced by overhangs designed to deflect attacker's projectiles. The door's defense system is completed by matriculations in the passageway and slit windows placed at various heights to provide crossbowmen with positions from which to fire out and down. During a battle the gate's defense could be improved by quickly installing wooden hoardings supported on beams fixed in the walls above the gate and at the top of the towers. The construction of the cathedral of Saint Nazarius and Saint Celsus dates back to June 12th 1096 when Pope Urban II blessed the stones used to build it. The doorway consists of five rows of coving supported on each side by five small columns decorated with capitals. The door on a level with a third span in the north aisle was probably built in the second decade of the 12th century. The church is cruciform in plan with a wide Romanesque nave whose barrel vault is supported by two side aisles with Roman arches. During the reconstruction of the cathedral apse between 1270 and 1320 a transepting choir with six chapels and a polygonal apse were added to the existing Romanesque nave. 22 windows including two large rose windows replaced the walls between the slender vaulting ribs to celebrate the spirituality of light. A series of sculptures, a great innovation in Languedoc, completed the church's decorative appearance. 22 statues were placed beneath canopies embellished with gables and pinnacles and ensconced between the columns supporting the choir and apse vaults. In the Middle Ages Carcassonne and surrounding villages was one of the centers of the Cathar reform movement. The Cathars were a heretical Christian sect that was very active in southern France from the 11th through the 13th centuries. Catharism represented a return to the gospel, especially the gospel of John, but the Cathars interpreted it according to a dualistic conception of the world. The human soul was divine and created by God while all matter, including the body, was created by an evil god. Two ancient wells, however, still stand in the streets of the old town, the so-called small well on the Route Bleue and the big well on the Place du Grand Prix or square of the big well. The big well is 40 meters deep and dates back to the 16th century. Carcassonne's open-air auditorium, the Théâtre Jean Deschamps, backs onto the tower. Opposite it, a simple fan-shaped platform is erected without any tiers. Chairs and benches are set out to accommodate an audience of some 5,000 spectators. The region Languedoc-Roussillon stretches from the lower reaches of the Rhône valley in the northeast to the mountains of the Pyrenees and the Spanish border in the south. Wine has been produced in Languedoc for more than 2,000 years. The Greeks, Phoenicians, and later the Romans established colonies to produce wine and oil here. In the early 16th century, the Champagne region of France was only producing a few still wines. That is when a monk from the Abbey of Saint-Hilaire, 8 miles south of Carcassonne, discovered that his carefully corked bottles of wines had become effervescent in a few months' time. The first French bubbly was born. Reds, whites, rosés, sparkling wines, the AOCs of Languedoc come in a variety of colors. The production is principally in red wine with some rosé and white in single grape varietals, Chardonnay especially. The wine is made using principally the grape varieties Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Syrah. The AOCs of Languedoc come in a variety of colors. The area's first inhabitants understood that this plain in the Aude Valley was located in a strategic place. Nestled between the Black Mountain and the slopes of the Pyrenees, Carcassonne is situated on an important communication route leading from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. Since pre-Roman times, a fortified settlement has existed on the hill where Carcassonne now stands.