A trip to Cathar Country in the Langedoc - 3
Beziers and Minerve

Beziers was the scene of the frightful massacre in July 1209 which got the Albigensian Crusade off to an historically bad start. When the soldiers asked the Papal Legate how to distinguish the orthodox from the 'heretics', he said, 'Kill them all: the Lord will know his own'. And this guy thought of himself as a spiritual leader. Apparently, between 8,000 and 20,000 were killed. Just as no one could spell in those days, it looks as if no one could count, either. The Town Museum is very good and an example to any town of 71,000. (We have 175,000 in Islington & our museum is under-funded, volunteer-bound, threatened by a neo-fascist Council & tiny...). We had intermittent rain, so there are not as many photos:-

The town running down to the Orb River	The Cathedral of St. Nazaire	Cathedral cloisters
The Old Bridge, the longest Medieval bridge still in use.		We will take some more piccies on another trip.

Minerve is West of Beziers & North-East of Carcassonne & by time he & his army arrived, later in 1209, the ghastly Simon de Montfort had cleaned up his act...a little bit. Because of its dramatic setting over a limestone gorge, one is puzzled just how to invest it until you see the model in the enchanting museum of the town, where the history of the Cathars is shown in a number of small display cases. Simon the Wicked had to bombard it with rocks for seven weeks before he could get in, when he confined himself to 'only' burning 140 Perfects.

The Gorge Minerve sits above

Minerve

The bridge into Minerve