A Book of the Pyrenees/Chapter 18
CHAPTER XVIII
LA CERDAGNE
FROM Ax-les-Thermes a good carriage road crosses the Col de Puy Morens to the Cerdagne and to Puygcerda in Spanish territory. It passes through most bald and weariful uplands, under the Pic de Carlitte, which is the highest point of the watershed between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The height of this peak is 9580 feet, and its flanks are starred with lakes, many of which are frozen through a great part of the year, more than are found in any other part of the Pyrenees. The Etang de Lanous is three kilometres long and from 500 to 600 yards across, pinched in the middle so as to form two basins. It is covered with ice for about nine months. It swarms with red-fleshed Salmo alpinus, which is excellent eating.
All this portion of the chain is almost barren and sad. The road leads through a dreary country, where the snow lies long, and the scanty grass is burnt with the frozen streams, and heaped with granitic blocks thrown up by moraines of glaciers that no longer exist. A few miserable villages are passed till the ruins are reached of the Castle of Carol, of which two towers remain. This was at one time the chief place of the valley, and it maintained independence in the midst of the county of Cerdagne.
At Quès the river of Carol, flowing south, is arrested by a barrier of rocks, formed to serve for irrigation by means of a canal, as far as Puygcerda. It is, perhaps, the earliest recorded instance, at least in medieval times, of such an economic undertaking. This canal was constructed in 1318, by virtue of a charter of Sanchez, King of Majorca. It was so well constructed that it serves its purpose admirably to the present day, fertilizing the fields below it, whereas above the life-giving stream the mountain side is barren. When the Treaty of the Pirenees was drawn in 1659 it was stipulated that this barrier and the canal from it, though on territory ceded to France, should be maintained in good order.
The Cerdagne became an independent state soon after the Moorish invasion of 731. It was governed by a Berber chief, Munuza by name, who threw in his lot with the Franks against the Yemenite Arabs of the South, and even married a daughter of Eudes, Duke of Aquitaine. But he was killed near Puygcerda; his head was salted, and sent to the Caliph of Damascus.
About 928 Miro, Count of Barcelona, gave Cerdagne to his son Oliba Cabréta, and it was ruled by its own counts till 1117, when the last died childless, and then it was reannexed to the county of Barcelona, and later went to Aragon. Finally, by the peace of 1659, it was divided, much to the indignation of the inhabitants, who protested ineffectually—half went to France, and half remained to Spain. France thrust her frontier down the Spanish slope of the mountains, taking in the rivers that flow south to feed the Ebro, just as Spain carried her frontier beyond the highest crests of the range to include the Val d'Aran and the head waters of the Garonne. But this acquisition on the part of France was not as unreasonable as it would seem, for the object was to secure communication between Foix and the Conflant and Valespir valleys that opened unto the plain of Roussillon, which had also become incorporated into the kingdom of France.
There is, however, a curious little enclave of twelve square kilometres, about the town of Llivia, completely surrounded by French territory, that remains Spanish. The explanation of this anomaly is as follows: At the Peace of the Pyrenees Spain agreed to surrender to France thirty-three villages in Cerdagne. But Llivia haughtily protested that she was not a village, but a town, once a city with a bishop of her own, consequently did not come within the terms of the agreement. This was admitted, and Llivia remains Spanish, much to the inconvenience of the custom-house officers, who have to maintain a cordon of douaniers about the petty territory. Now Llivia, that possesses 330 inhabitants, regrets the past. Spain exacts of her taxes to the amount of 30,000 francs, and gives her nothing in return—neither a post office, nor telegraph, nor roads. The post office has to be kept up by the citizens, so also the roads till they reach the frontier. Llivia was a Roman town founded in honour of the wife of Augustus, and some remains of the Roman walls exist. It is a poor, decayed place. A castle in ruins occupies the highest point of the hill on which it is built; the large church is planted on a terrace above the cold, slated roofs of the sordid houses and narrow streets of the town.
Cerdagne is the country of the Ceretani of Pliny, and the same people occupied the Valespir, and have left their name in the town of Ceret. The race was not Iberic, but purely Celtic, and their name is the same as that given to Ceretica, or Ceredigion, Cardigan in Wales.
Whilst Llivia decays malodorously under Spanish neglect, a little hamlet on French soil, Bourg-Madame, is growing into vigorous and fresh life. Not many years ago it was nothing but a cluster of a couple of taverns and a station of the customs, and it was called Guinguettes d'Hix. But the situation favoured it, standing on the frontier at the point where the high road from Barcelona is linked on to a network of French main roads. Moreover, Barcelona derives much of its butter and cheese from the French Cerdagne, and the trade consequently passes through the place. In 1815 the Duke of Angoulême entered France by this door on the frontier, and the inhabitants obtained from him leave to alter the name of the growing town to Bourg-Madame.
The Pyrenees of this part of the chain is one of the most barren mountain systems in Europe. The passes into Spain are mere notches cut to a depth of 600 to 900 feet in the ridge, that rises to a height of about 8000 feet above the sea. Even the mountain peaks have little individual character, and from the high land whence seen do not show their true elevation.
Nevertheless this portion of the range is a paradise for botanists; plants are found here that are discoverable in no other part of the Pyrenees. The granatic elevated plateau is strewn with lakes, already alluded to, which are the sources of the Ariège, the Aude, the Segre, and the Têt. The peasants believe that these are relics of Noah's flood, patches of water that loitered and were left behind when the Deluge was past and the flood was engulfed. And they are further convinced that the ark rested on the Puyg Péne. North and east of the plateau the ground falls away in a series of terraces cleft by ravines; the finest and best known of these latter is that of the Aude, visited from the baths of Cascanières.
In this upland region is a fortress created by Vauban, Mont Louis, in which a couple of companies are quartered, and spend a joyless time, where the winter lasts ten months out of the twelve. The fortifications enclose but a handful of houses. It stands at the height of 5280 feet above the sea, and is commanded by mountains that rise to 6685 feet, as the Pic de la Tausse, but they do not impress one with sense of height. Mont Louis stands at the point of suture of the three little provinces out of which Louis XIII formed that of Roussillon—the Conflent, the Capcir, and Cerdagne.
In Mont Louis there is nothing to be seen of particular interest. The church was built from designs of Vauban. On the terrace is the monument of General Dagobert, who died in 1794. It consists of a pile of granite surmounted by a bomb. Dagobert was, however, not a native of this place, but of Saint Lô, in Manche. He had been sub-lieutenant in the regiment of Touraine in the Seven Years' War, and when the Revolution broke out he was sent as General of Division with the army of Italy, and met with some success. He was less fortunate when commanding an army in the Pyrénées Orientales; he met with defeat at Trouillas, and was relieved of his charge and arrested. But he succeeded in justifying himself, before the Committee of Public Safety, by showing that his failure was due to the jealousy and disobedience of the generals placed under his orders. He was re-established in his position and allowed to carry on the campaign according to a plan proposed by himself to the Convention. He reached Perpignan in March, 1794, but could not obtain from Dugommier more than a few battalions in place of the 12,000 infantry and 600 cavalry that had been ordered to be placed at his disposal. At the head of a small body of men he went to Puygcerda and invaded Catalonia, took the strong position of Monteska, and surrounded Urgel. On 10 April he entered that city, which redeemed itself from sack by paying a contribution of 10,000 francs. Then he attempted to besiege the citadel, but found it to be too strong to be taken, and he retreated on the morrow. He was conveyed ill to Puygcerda on 17 April, where he died.
To the south-east of Mont Louis is Planès, where there is a curious church, some suppose of Moorish constructure, by others attributed to the tenth century, by others again set as late as the twelfth. It consists of an equilateral triangle, surmounted by a cupola, and each angle rounded off. That this curious monument should be of Moorish origin is most improbable. The Arabs in France destroyed much, but built nothing.
The hermitage of Font-Romeu is a pilgrimage resort with a Calvary, situated at the height of 5330 feet, and commanding a wide panorama.
The way to it is through a pine wood, the old trees bearded with grey lichen. A hermit takes charge of the shrine—a real hermit, one of the rare survivals; they are now almost as extinct as the dodo and the great auk. The sanctuary is the very Mecca of Cerdagne and Capcir. On 8 September as many as three thousand pilgrims assemble here; the place is like a disturbed ant-heap. The visitors do not restrain themselves to devotional exercises; they also dine, drink, sing. Then may be seen the white caps, laced, of Conflent and Roussillon; the kerchief of glaring colours—red, yellow, and blue—of the women of Cerdagne; men wearing the red barretina and the cord-soled spadrillos, Catalonians these who have not abandoned their old costume. The miraculous image is a seated Madonna, with head and hands out of all proportion to the body. It spends the winter in the church of Odeillo, but revisits Font-Romeu as soon as the rhododendrons begin to flush the mountain sides.
In winter Mont Louis is a cold and wretched prison. Clouds envelop the mountain-tops, cold rain and heavy falls of snow alternate with furious and icy gales. In summer the vapours often fill the valley, and from the ramparts of Mont Louis is seen the spectacle of a vast plain of snow, recalling the scenes of winter; but the snow now is the surface of cloud lying low, silvered by the light from above.
This wild country saw the end of Othman abu Nessu, the Moorish Governor of Narbonne.
In 725 Ambessa, Moslem Governor of Spain, crossed the Pyrenees. Cascassonne and Nîmes vainly endeavoured to resist him. In the midst of his successes, however, death surprised him. But he left the Arabs masters of Septimania, where they established themselves in force and made Narbonne their capital. The struggle between Moslem and Christian for the possession of the soil of France now became a struggle desperate in its earnestness.
Eudes, Duke of Aquitania, was at the time hampered by an attack from the North by Charles Martel, Duke of the Franks. In his extremity he made overtures to Othman, Governor of Narbonne, who was not a Saracen, but a Moor. The Moors were Berbers from Northern Africa, of the same blood as the Iberians of Spain; they had been conquered by the Arabs and forced to become Mahomedans. Eudes gave his beautiful daughter Lampagia to Othman, who became deeply attached to his Christian wife, and promised his assistance against the new Emir, Abderahman. This latter came over the Col de Perche and threatened Narbonne. Othman was deserted by his men, and fled to Llivia with his wife and a few attendants. He soon perceived that it was not possible to defend the little town, and he escaped and attempted to cross the Col de Morens. In his flight he was entreated to halt by Lampagia, to slake her thirst at a spring and rest on the turf by it. Othman and she were surrendering themselves to the pleasing hope that they were safe, when they saw a detachment of Saracens in full pursuit.
The servants took to flight, but Lampagia was too weary to join them, and Othman would not abandon his wife. In a moment they were surrounded, and Othman, rather than fall into the hands of his enemies, flung himself down the precipice and perished. His head was cut off and sent to Abderahman along with Lampagia. She was so lovely in the eyes of the Emir that he sent her to Damascus to the Commander of the Faithful.
Abderahman pursued his successes, but met with discomfiture on the fields of Poitiers in October, 732, and he himself was among the slain.