The Dove of Montségur

Medieval Musings

SPOILER ALERT: 

some details in this post reveal

plot elements of The Dove of Montségur

Although my first love at university was medieval Italy, hence Dante studies, the dolce stil novo, the Sicilian School, the history of Florence etc., I also took a course in Provençal (today more correctly called Occitan), the language of the population of Southern France, and hence of the troubadours, the poetic ancestors of the sommo poeta (the 'supreme poet') Dante Alighieri. The course was dull and poorly taught, but the subject matter was intriguing, the language of the troubadours rich and exciting, seemingly a blend of Spanish, Italian and French with original elements. And the troubadours were such innovators!

Can vei la lauzeta mover  'When I see the lark spread its wings' by Bernart de Ventadorn (circa 1145 - 1200) performed  here by Ensemble Alla Francesca

My first novel, Evin of the Trees, is set within a broad time frame (some time in the Bronze Age) and features extensive travelling. The next story had to be more circumscribed, to deal with one episode in a restricted time and place. What better than a mountaintop fortress during a siege? Research on Southern French history associated with the troubadours brought to light Montségur and the tragedy of the bonshommes, better known as Cathars. It seemed a fitting focal point.

It happened here, almost 800 years ago, in what was then the County of Toulouse

This time, instead of basing myself on literary surmise and hypotheses, I would recount an historical episode to which I would add my own twist. Several mysteries were attached to Montségur; it was diverting to play with these for my own ends.

One mystery concerns the treasure the bonshommes were said to have secreted out of Montségur

Then there was the ulterior motive. The first novel deals indirectly with the power of the written word and posits what may have been one of mankind's early Mysteries. The second would consider what the spread and conservation of the written word (and hence of knowledge) owed to the innovation of paper-making. The manufacture of paper must have been kept hidden for a time, like all trade secrets.

The technique of papermaking with hemp and even flax combings was known in Europe long before the 13th century, but the innovation of making paper from linen rags took a while to be appreciated. At Fabriano, Italy, processes were developed which greatly improved both the manufacture and the quality of paper.

The poor, doomed bonshommes dovetailed beautifully with this concept, for not only did they respect the written word, they insisted that all their adepts learn to read. This was an exceptional goal at the time. If anything the Catholic Church was glad to keep its flock in ignorance. Thus it was tempting to link the bonshommes' endeavour with a new technology that they could use for their own ends, to conserve and disseminate knowledge.

This is a scribe; yet reading as well as writing was a skill only the clergy and the elite could aspire to

The irony is that virtually all the bonshommes' documents were destroyed; the only testimony we have  lies in the registers of the Inquisition which was set up specifically to eradicate the Albigensian heretics (another name for the Cathars) in the early 13th century. It is not hard to imagine how one-sided this testimony is.

Conrad of Marburg, the first Inquisitor from the founding of the Inquisition in 1233, active in the Albigensian Crusade; another Inquisitor active at the time was Guillaume Arnaud who appears in The Dove of Montségur

Researching for Dove was another fascinating, involving task. The internet was extremely useful of course, but this time I had a vague background knowledge of medieval French literature and times. It was satisfying not only to write about a time and protagonists which had always intrigued me, but to discover more about them along the way. The beauty of writing historical novels is that you learn as you go but you have a license to deal with the facts as you will.

What power at one's fingertips! To change the course of history; suggest motivation, links, undercurrents; associate one's fictitious protagonists with the Greats of the past; create a world resembling the historical one, but with wrinkles all your own!