Katherine Neville, Saint Namphaise, and Chain Mail

Katherine Neville speaking at Readers Books in Sonoma, California.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of meeting one of my favorite authors, Katherine Neville. Her debut novel The Eight has the distinction of being the first hardcover book published by Ballantine Books twenty years ago.


Ballantine wanted something special to have that honor and The Eight certainly fulfilled their wildest aspirations as it has been translated into thirty six languages and is a reliable back-list title. It is a book that was difficult to pigeonhole into a single genre when it appeared on the literary scene in 1988 and to this day still flummoxes people wanting to slap a convenient label on its cover.

The Eight is a complex novel set in two different parallel time frames; one is during the French Revolution and the other in the 1970s in New York and Algeria. The extensive cast of characters - some historical figures and some purely fictional - are obsessed by a mythical chess set that once belonged to Charlemagne and is reputed to bear a secret formula for power.

Chess also serves as a powerful metaphor to describe the intricate moves and counter-moves in the plot.



The long awaited sequel The Fire has a similar structure of two parallel plot threads set in different times. The contemporary time frame is at the beginning of the Iraq War and set in Colorado and Washington, D.C. and the historical time frame is set at the brink of the Greek war of independence and set in Asia, Europe and Africa.

Once again Neville has created a novel filled with intrigue, puzzles, mystery and betrayal.

Here's the book trailer:



Neville regaled us with discussing her books as well as her time spent as an employee of Bank of American in San Francisco and lived in nearby Sausalito. She fantasized about using their computer system to steal billions of dollars from her employer and did that through fiction. There were several retired BofA employees in the audience who had shared some stories with her before her talk.

I was interested to know how much chess she played since both novels are drenched in chess as well as literary alchemy. She said that she learned to play chess when she was eighteen and admitted that she gets "chess blindness." That strategic weakness wound up appearing in her sequel as her heroine became so wrapped up in a game that she did not realize she had beaten her opponent.

Neville then discussed how she has heard from many chess grandmasters including Susan Polgar the first woman to break the grandmaster gender barrier. After Katherine had turned in her manuscript, she read Polgar's memoir and wanted to change one small detail of changing the final move in a chess game. Instead of something good, she wanted the perfect move that would echo a move Polgar made in order to earn her status as grandmaster.

The bad news was that the book already had the Advanced Reader Copies printed. However, Katherine later read the ARC and discovered that three and a half pages were missing.

Missing.

This time they had to stop the presses to add in the accidentally excluded three and a half pages. And since they were doing that...she was able to get them to change the text to reflect her preferred chess move.

She said they had to include an addendum to the reviewers who received the ARCs so that they had the missing pages.

At least the printers did not spell her name wrong on the spine of the book. A few months ago Kristin Nelson had a post on her blog written anonymously by an editor that realized after a book was printed and sitting on the bookshelf in her office that an author's name was misspelled.

Oops.

That mistake brought about the pulping of 40,000 paperbacks, but thankfully they had not been shipped to any stores when the error was discovered.

Kristen Nelson had also blogged about clients of hers who discovered by checking early copies of that an uncorrected proof copy had mistakenly had gone to print and another client discovered an editorial question embedded in page 110 of the ARC that had somehow not been deleted.

Double yikes.

The good thing to take away from those stories was that the publishers were willing to make things right.

Anyway, back to discussing the books signing. It was my pleasure to meet Katherine and schmooze with her about writing, historical fiction and Charlemagne.




Her website has been retooled and it is filled with lovely extras such as podcasts where she discusses various aspects of the books and research methods. There is also a contest to win signed first editions of The Eight and The Fire. You can also check out her events schedule to see if she will be coming to a bookstore near you.

Unfortunately it only lists those signings in the United States at this time. She mentioned she will be traveling to Spain where The Eight has been listed as one its top ten books of all times - and that includes books by Cervantes!

One thing that she mentioned in her talk (and is also in the podcast about research) is how she would discover serendipitous facts that influenced her writing. These things happened so frequently that she came to expect them.

My friend Molly Dwyer spoke about this same phenomenon at the most recent meeting of my writers club.

Rob Koslowsky's write up of Molly's talk included this:

One technique (Molly) employs is to find a historical legend to resolve problems in developing the narrative and “make the writing work.” Solutions to problems will appear as you write, especially if you believe in meaningful coincidence – synchronicity. “Allow coincidences to inform your writing,” she insists, and “as you open up your writing, an upwelling of the collective consciousness occurs.” She gave an example of researching Sainte Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, and discovering that January 3rd is her feast day and that is the date of her lead character's death. It was a significance she could not plan, but worked perfectly for her story's needs.

In fact, that kind of synchronicity is how I discovered Saint Namphaise. There was a hermit used in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso that was not given a name. During the writing of my adaptation, I felt uncomfortable having a character on the page for so long without a name. I decided to find a name for him and went to an online Catholic directory of saints hoping to find something with some symbolic significance.

After plugging in the term "hermit" in the search function for saints I was surprised to find there were over 500 listed. I started reading them in alphabetical order and thought finding a name would only take a few minutes. That is until I realized they had brief biographies I kept reading. And reading.

Some would call it procrastination, but I could not just settle on a name without searching for the "perfect one." Then I came across the listing for Saint Namphaise.

Today is also Saint Namphaise's feast day so I am frantically trying to finish this blog post while it is still November 12th.

According to legend, this obscure saint was once a soldier serving Charlemagne before dedicating his life to serving God. I am trying my level best to rescue this saint from obscurity and would like to re-post some of my favorite pictures associated with Saint Namphaise in honor of his feast day.

First is the marker denoting the site where he once helped build a monastery.



Here is my favorite photo taken during our trip to France which shows the mystical waters of the Gouffre de Lantouy near Cajarc.

Gouffre de Lantouy

This is the first real vision we had of the abbey in ruins showing arches and more than just a pile of rocks.

I hope that others will join me in celebrating this largely forgotten hermit saint associated with Charlemagne.

And for my medievalist readers, I wanted to mention that there is a contest to win chain mail by Orbit Books to promote the release of the book The Company by K.J. Parker. The contest ends on the morning of November 24th, so enter today. Hat tip to Andrew Wheeler.

There is also a post about a successful book launch for Geri Westerson's Veil of Lies which included two men in armor from Imperial Knights of Norco, California performing a bit of swordplay. I like that kind of creative ideas for book promotions.

Lastly, I wanted to point out that this is my 100th blog post and is nearing the second anniversary of when I started this literary blog.

I know many bloggers update far more frequently than I do, but I have chosen the path of having more substance to my posts over frequency. For those interested in following my blog I hope you will take advantage of the RSS feeds to be alerted for updates.

Cheers to Saint Namphaise - my favorite obscure French saint.

Paris, the city of light and fire jugglers

I'm going to continue blogging about my trip to France while the details are fresh in my mind.

Now however, I am going to try and recreate where we went chronologically. I started by sharing with you my story about Saint Namphaise because that was my favorite.

I was surprised a day after I first posted an entry on my blog on the Gouffrey de Lantouy to receive an email from a webmaster in the Quercy region asking for permission to republish the essay on his website. He found out about my post due to the wonder of Google Alerts. If you are unfamiliar with that little wonder of modern technology, go to www.google.com/alerts and sign up to receive notifications whenever the topic of your choice is posted to the internet.

You can read the abridged version of my blog posts on the French Entrée website here.

Now to recreate our journey including pictures from our trip, my husband requests that I put forth the following message: All photos Copyright (c) 2007 Scott C. Nevin and Linda C. McCabe, All Rights Reserved.

Not all the pictures are as good as that the mystical one showing the Gouffre de Lantouy, but in deference to my husband's wishes and in the desire to maintain marital harmony I shall include that proviso. Should anyone wish to reuse these photos, just ask me and tell me in what context it will be used.

:Ahem: Now that those formalities are concluded...

We landed in Paris on a Monday morning and had been traveling for somewhere close to twenty-four hours. Yes, we caught a few hours of really lousy sleep on the plane, but still...we were not on our top form. The goal was to stay awake until nightfall and then sleep until morning. It was our hope that we would then overcome jetlag and force ourselves onto Paris time and no longer be on Pacific Coast time.

After getting through Customs and claiming our luggage, we forced ourselves through the sea of humanity that was Charles de Gaulle International Airport.

We first found an ATM to have Euros in hand to pay for the van and for spending money. For those who haven't traveled to Europe before and are still thinking that you should exchange your dollars and/or bring travelers checks, do not waste your time. You will pay a fee for purchasing money when you can just use your bank's ATM and it will calculate the exchange rate for you. Yes, you may have to pay a withdrawl fee, but that is just a different fee you have to pay. Also, travelers checks are not used very much any more. The easiest thing is to just pray to the Money God and have it spit out the paper Euros in your hand when you land.

Our hotel had arranged a shuttle van to pick us up and deliver us to the hotel. All we had to do was call once we arrived.

The hotel we stayed at in Paris was incredible. I stumbled across it by accident as I was planning my itinerary of historical sights and museums to visit. I did a Google search to follow up on Hotel Dieu the oldest hospital in Paris that was founded in 651 AD. I was surprised to find out that this working hospital also has fourteen hotel rooms.

It is the only hotel on the Isle de la Cité and it is next to Notre Dame Cathedral.

Here is a photo showing its lavish courtyard.

To get to the hotel section you have to enter through the main entrance which is also marked for emergencies, turn down a hallway, pass that magnificent courtyard, walk up a flight of twelve stone steps, go down another hallway filled with historic woodcuts such as this:




Then you enter a hallway and take an elevator to the top floor. There you will find two doors, one to Cardiology and the other to the Hotel-Hopitel.

There is another courtyard which isn't filled with the extensive plant life, but it is still impressive. You can get a sense of the columns and arches that I've never seen before in hospitals.


You can see in the center of that picture a colorful statue. Here it is from the front side in all of its "glory."



I think it looks a tad out of place, but who am I? Just an American who thinks this statue looks strange given the historic setting.

I'm not sure who Polnagreff is, but another blogger claims it is a play on words for a French singer. His blog has a lot more pictures of Hotel Dieu's wards than I took. If you are interested in seeing more about the hospital, check out his blog.

The rooms in the Hotel-Hopitel are are non-smoking, have private baths, and if you are lucky like we were: skylight windows that overlook Notre Dame.


Yes, we were heard the bells of Notre Dame all the time. I was a little afraid that they would be ringing throughout the night, but we didn't hear them after 8 pm, nor did we hear them before 8 am.

The bell ringing was nice. We would hear it ring to mark each fifteen minutes. Usually at the top of the hour you would hear a nice melody and then the marking of the hours. I became enchanted with the sound.

Then, I noticed at least on two separate occasions that the bell ringing did not follow the same melody. That instead of a soothing carillon, it sounded like someone was just clanging on the bells. One night at 7:30 pm it seemed as if it rang for five minutes straight. I was becoming annoyed when it did not stop.

I have no confirmation on this, but the only explanation that made any sense to me for such a dramatic difference in ring tones was if someone slipped the bell master some money so that they could have the opportunity to ring the bells of Notre Dame.

Enough on the bells and the noise, noise, noise!

The day we checked into the hotel, we dropped off our luggage and immediately left to try and get as much sight seeing in as possible. Our goal was to stay awake by walking. I knew that my mind wasn't really into doing a lot of historical research being as tired as I was, but I also didn't want to waste any time in Paris.

The first thing we did was visit Notre Dame. How could we not? There it was larger than life in front of our hotel. Even if it was built centuries after Charlemagne, I couldn't be that close to such a landmark and not go inside. Here is the front door:


The stained glass was amazing.


The entire cathedral was filled with ornate and beautiful artwork. It was dazzling to the eyes and yet it still could inspire private reflection.


There were also many statues of saints that graced the various alcoves. Here is Sainte Jeanne d'Arc.

And another image of her. The Maid who took up arms and inspired the army of France in the Hundred Years War.


Outside the cathedral is covered in statues. Here is the patron saint of Paris, Saint Denis. He's the one holding his head.



Then above the door are the kings in the Bible. During the French revolution they were thought by some people to be representing the kings of France. Since during the frenzy of that time anything to do with kings or royalty was attacked, they lost their heads. These statues have been restored and you cannot tell from your average street level vantage point that at one time they were mutilated.


We did not want to wait in the long line to go up to the bell tower, so we left the cathedral and we were really hungry. We went in search of food and walked past the numerous restaurants in the shadow of the cathedral because we didn't want to succumb to tourist trap food. We wanted something better than that. We walked around the island and found a salon de thé that served lunch.

My first real attempt at understanding French when it was spoken to me did not go the way that I had hoped. The waiter greeted us as we entered the restaurant and asked us if we were there for tea or for lunch. I had forgotten that déjeuner was the word for lunch in French. My mental gears were grinding and I remembered that petit déjeuner meant breakfast and I did not understand why he was asking if I wanted breakfast.

The vacant stare in my eyes told him that I didn't understand. He repeated the question in English.

I had this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. We were dooooomed.

One year of French lessons and I could not even understand that simple question.

I did not flog myself too badly because I knew that I was not at my top form. I was hungry and really tired. I hoped that I would redeem my linguistic skills later when fully rested and fed.

We sat inside the small restaurant and as we were reviewing the menu, some people who had been sitting at the outside tables left. I had wanted to switch tables because the pull of sitting at a Paris sidewalk cafe was something I felt I needed to do.

A woman came to take our order and I tried asking if we could sit outside. I did not have the right words to make myself clear and then she showed us a different menu. Scott thought that they must have different pricing for inside tables and outside tables. At that point, I decided, I will just sit here and order.

In retrospect, I think she was trying to switch menus to the tea and not the lunch.

I did my best to order in French and thought I did a reasonable job. Thing is, they had sold out of the quiche that I had wanted and the woman tried telling me which ones they still had. I did not understand what she was saying and after another attempt she left in frustration and the waiter returned and explained that she did not speak any English.

After the mix-up was settled, we had a wonderful lunch of saumon quiche, salade, and oignon soupe.

Afterwards we started walking again and we went to the right bank. I had a target which I had thought we wouldn't have time to visit, so I hadn't done much research on what it would contain but I liked the name Le Musée de l'Histoire de France. I don't know what I expected to see, but we arrived late and as I tried to buy tickets, we were directed to a door for the gratuit entrance.

The courtyard was pretty spectacular.


We quickly learned in Paris and later on in the rest of France, to keep your eyes out for artwork in the nooks and crannies everywhere.


Once we got inside all that was open to the public were ornate living quarters.

It was here that I saw for the first time in France my favorite Greek goddess, Athena. This is not my favorite depiction of her, but I did not realize that I would be seeing her again and again on my trip. She is everywhere in France. I do not know if I saw more depictions of Athena or of Joan of Arc.

It is the helmet and the sword that is the dead give away that the artist is depicting Athena.



There was a second portrait of her as well that looks even less than what I consider to be Athena's character. Here I get the feeling of that instead of Athena it is Aphrodite donning the helmet of the gray eyed goddess of wisdom and victory. Maybe the artist just preferred Aphrodite and every woman he painted wound up resembling her.


We left and Scott wanted to see the gardens in front of the Louvre. So we walked there.

It was then that our legs and feet started feeling sore. We walked and walked.

We didn't get lost because we had good maps, but we continued with our plan to stay awake by keeping busy. Here are the Tuileries.



There is also a triumphal arch in front of the Louvre.



Here you can make out the Ferris wheel the is centered in the arch.


The Tuileries Gardens is filled with sculptures. This is one of my favorites because it reminds me of the famous Laocoon statue. Yes, that is a huge snake that is coiled around the man and child. Pretty dramatic, eh?

I was growing hungry again, and I thought to just get a snack from a sidewalk vendor selling pastries. As I stood in line and looked at the offerings, I decided instead to get something more substantial. I chose the Quiche Lorraine.

It was sinful; drenched in butter and lighter than air.

Scott who only wanted a cookie from the vendor had a taste of my quiche and then proceeded to challenge me for every last bite.

That was enough for one day.

We needed our rest and would begin in earnest the next morning to see the various sights and museums I had chosen to visit.

One thing we were unprepared for was the reality that the square in front of Notre Dame is a gathering spot at night. There were sometimes hundreds of people just hanging out.

One night as we came back from dinner we saw a crowd gathered around some street performers who were juggling with fire.

Personally, it seemed a bit sacrilegious to be doing that in front of a church, but it was a crowd pleaser.

Sorry, but we didn't get a picture of that, however here is Notre Dame at night.




More on Paris next time...

Linda

Another abbey and an elusive tomb

ETA: my husband requested that I add this comment: All photos Copyright (c) 2007 Scott C. Nevin and Linda C. McCabe, All Rights Reserved.


In my last installment, I showed you photos from our discovery of the magical Gouffre de Lantouy and its abbaye en ruines.

We left the beautiful village of Cajarc after having a fabulous lunch and continued on our journey.


It shouldn't have taken us very long, after all it was only about two inches or so on a map. However, that doesn't take into account the back country roads and the mountainous terrain.

In preparing for our trip we bought a Garmin GPS unit and a software package with the roads in France. I also bought a comprehensive, spiral bound Michelin map.

The first few days we tried just plugging our destination into the GPS and have faith that it would take us there. We soon discovered that it seemed to be possessed with the soul of HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey. It had a mind of its own and we frequently found ourselves muttering things like, "why would it pick this road?"

Seriously, the Garmin seemed to have an affinity for roads that were little more than paved goat paths. There were times when we found ourselves on a road that was one lane and wondered why it had an aversion to roads with lanes and white stripes .

It seemed to think that all roads had the same rate of speed on them and it would calculate anything that it thought was closest to the flight path of a white winged black bird.

Except well, that led to small roads with twists and turns that while picturesque were liable to make me nauseous.

We soon started to override its itinerary by referencing the Michelin maps.

Every time we passed one of its suggested turns the unit would then say, "recalculating" in a tone of voice that sounded disappointed and just a touch irritated.

Many of the road have letters and numbers. The A roads were large, limited access, and usually we had to pay a toll when we drove on them. The N roads were large, but they didn't have the same limited access as the A roads and they were slower.

Then you had the D roads which we thought of as Departmental roads. Those came in two colors - yellow and white. The yellow were the larger and more well traveled roads. The white ones were smaller and had more of the iffy factors.

Then there were the C roads. C is for chevre or goat. Definite goat paths.

Usually it would say "turn left on D 24" or some such thing. One time the Garmin suggested that we "turn left on Road and then turn on Unpaved Road."

The fact that the first turn was an unnamed road without was bad enough, but to then suggest we then go on an unpaved road?

Hah! The driver and navigator said nooooooo.

We also tried to use road signs suggesting routes to various towns and sights. They were helpful, but we couldn't depend on them because they were not as prevalent as we would have liked.

We drove along the Lot river gorges and if you've ever wondered where the word gorgeous comes from...I believe it has to come from seeing such magnificent sights.


Pretty spectacular, eh?

We slowly made our way up to Marcilhac-sur-Célé knowing that they had an ancient abbey. It was in the midst of the village and I knew that we would encounter people, unlike the abbey near the Lantouy. I did not expect to see a tour bus.

Ugh.

I doubt they were there on a pilgrimage to see sacred sites associated with Saint Namphaise, but I didn't ask either.

I went inside the tourist information office and heard a guide speaking to a group, and he was speaking in French. I knew then that it would be unlikely that he would have any time to answer my questions about Saint Namphaise and the reported link to the ancient abbey. Or to ask if there was anything standing that dated back to the eighth or ninth century.

Instead, I simply grabbed some brochures before strolling about the grounds and snapping some pictures. The abbey is definitely in ruins, and it appears that it may have been built and rebuilt at varying times over the centuries. You can notice that with the difference in styles of the arches.


Then again, there are some of the ruins that are little more than standing rock.


The translated version of the website for the town can be found here. Honestly, I don't know if any of the walls still standing might have stood when Saint Namphaise worshiped there. I suspect that those walls have long been taken down, but the stones were reused to build the later structures.


.

I love seeing the blue sky through the vacant window and non-existent roof juxtaposed with plant life growing on the walls. It gives me the feeling that the earth is trying to reclaim the man made structure.
Here's another view of archways that no longer serve their original purpose.

Our movement around the ancient abbey did not go unnoticed. A cat was perched on top of a wall out of reach, but not out of sight.




We saw this engraved on a wall and thought it was one of the most evocative images in all the churches we had visited.

There is a Gothic church next to the ruins of the abbey, but it was closed. We decided at that point to not try to find the cave Saint Namphaise was supposed to have lived in Quissac. It was getting late in the day and we still had an hour or so drive back to Monclar-de-Quercy where we were staying.

Instead, we chose to go to Caniac-du-Causse and look for his tomb. It was suggested on Quercy.net that passing under the pillars of his tomb would cure epilepsy.

I don't have epilepsy, but I sure wanted to see his reliquary. I had seen a lot of reliquaries while in France. Some large and some small.

I figured that his would probably be pretty large because I didn't think that his remains would have been in great demand from a multitude of churches, so it might have been more or less intact. Well, as intact as it can be when your death is from being gored by a bull.

We saw a sign that looked hopeful. Not only did it have the town we were looking for, but a mention of the crypt of Saint Namphaise.


We arrived in the small village and I found the shuttered tourist information office. I then walked to the town hall and showed my French print out of the legend of Saint Namphaise.

She nodded and spoke to me in French and I simply couldn't believe what she was trying to tell me. The church which happened to be next door to her office was closed.




Noooooooooooooo.

She even rattled the door to show me that it was locked. Then with a little back and forth with hacked up French and hacked up English it was conveyed that the church had an electrical problem.

Arrrrrrrgh.


I crossed an ocean and found my way to this small little village in Quercy, and I didn't get to see the pillars of his tomb.

She was nice enough however to give me a copy of their English language version of the Life of Saint Namphaise. It had a lot of similarities in that it mentioned Charlemagne, it credited Namphaise with starting the monastery near "the pit of Lantouy," and then the tragic destiny of that monastery with allegations of cooking young children bring about the destruction of the abbey.

There are some differences with the Quercy.net legend. One is that there was no mention of Marcilhac-sur-Célé, another was that the cave he was supposed to have lived in was said to be in Coursac and not Quissac.

However, I love the end of this legend for it says that "at the moment he was killed, there was a hammer in his hand, he threw it, and said: wherever it lands, I shall be buried.

The hammer bounced in Lacapellette and finally landed in Caniac du Causse."

Forgive me while I snicker. I mean, that is some Olympic record setting bounce.

That of course is what legend is all about. The town of Rocamadour claims that they have the sword of Roland from the legendary battle in Roncesvalles and that when he died he threw it in the air and it flew and landed in the side of their mountain.

That would be one heck of a throw.

Seeing that the location of Namphaise's cave is in dispute between Quissac and Coursac, (that is if he only had one and not multiple caves), I was glad that I hadn't insisted we go looking for his cave in the hope that there were some markers somewhere stating: Saint Namphaise slept in this wretched place.

Oh, and the legend she gave me also said that it was believed that "passing under the reliquary would cure sterility and recurring illnesses."

Hmmm, I wonder if it would dispense for the need of using Viagra as well.

If so, then the tourist trade would certainly pick up. That is, once they get their electrical problem solved and it is open for tourists and pilgrims to visit.

All in all it was a great day for exploring the French countryside. I never saw the tomb of Saint Namphaise, nor did I locate any chocolate éclairs. However, I did have some luscious chocolate mousse for lunch at Le President in Cajarc.

I'll tell you another story of a different place we visited in France next time.

Linda


Linda

Gouffre de Lantouy et la Abbaye en ruines

Or...Looking for Saint Namphaise, Part II

ETA: per my husband's request, he wanted me to place this notice on my blog:

All photos Copyright (c) 2007 Scott C. Nevin and Linda C. McCabe, All Rights Reserved.

In my last post I discussed how I set out to find places associated with Saint Namphaise. After my husband and I saw the hand lettered sign nailed to a tree telling us that we came upon "ce magnifique site" we noticed the pool of magical looking water.


There was a dry patch of land between this pool and a small stream that allowed us to walk past without getting our feet wet. I do not know if in other times of the year if those two bodies of water are connected, but if so - there was no footbridge to cross it. (Just a small word of warning should others try to follow my footsteps: you might want to bring boots in anticipation of fording a stream.)

I think this pool was the abyss mentioned in the legend of Saint Namphaise.

We walked past the water and came upon another small meadow that showed evidence of campfires. Visions of drunken teenagers hanging around flashed through my head. Then we saw a small blue arrow that had been tacked on a tree urging us to continue our search.


Here's another shot of the arrow on the tree.


We followed that arrow and found a path that diverged in a few places. I decided to follow the low lying path rather than scramble upwards. It was simply because after three weeks in France I had grown tired of climbing things and took the easy way.

That choice prolonged our discovery.

At first we came upon some stones that had clearly been some kind of physical structure, it just wasn't all that terribly impressive.


It looked like ruins, but it was hard to discern any real floor plan or anything else by it. We started assuming that this was about all we were going to see and we were a little disappointed. We had already gotten used to the idea that in France once a building goes into disuse and disrepair that its stones become prey to being re-used for future buildings. We kind of thought that it this abbey must also have been scavenged for its stone.

We walked further and found a larger path and followed that for awhile.


Then we realized that we could walk for miles and head up back in Cajarc. We turned around to return to the little stone structure but were sidetracked again by luminous water.


It was at this point that I started to get a little itchy. I knew there was more than what we first saw. I knew it in my bones.

I went back to the original structure we found and I started scrambling upon those rocks and went upwards. I started thinking, "hey, this is more like it."


My husband even snapped a picture of me with a triumphant look on my face as if to say, "look what I found."



Ah, but we were still finding the edges of our abbaye en ruines. We started going back to our car when I remembered that there were paths leading upward that I had consciously passed by.

This time I decided to follow them and see where they would lead.

Voilà.

To give you a perspective of just how small that doorway was - I crawled through it.





And then, well, here's a more triumphant look on my face.


My husband even had to grin as he sat upon an ancient wall.




We had found the monastery that according to legend was once founded by Saint Namphaise. Something was still standing. It may be in ruins, but you can still make out arches, walls, and possibly a well.

I'm not an archaeologist nor am I an expert in architecture, but unless someone definitively states that this structure had to have been from a later period of time and gives me good documented reasons - I am of the belief that a contemporary of Charlemagne once stood on that same ground. That the building was made either at the time of Charlemagne or before.

However, I do part ways from believing everything that is in the legends that I've read, particularly when it comes to the accusation of child sacrifice and cannibalism that occurred after Namphaise left the abbey.

Maybe it is because it is so horrific that I simply do not want to consider it as being reality. However, I am skeptical by nature and after having read W. Aren's The Man-Eating Myth: Anthropology and Anthropophagy I am particularly hesitant to believe that part of the legend. Arens conducted a study showing that accusations of cannibalism are far more prevalent than documented cases of cannibalism.

Accusing people of witchcraft, child sacrifice, and cannibalism has historically been done in order to condemn individuals or groups of people, and it was particularly prevalent in the Middle Ages. It was also difficult if not impossible to prove innocence, which is what the witchcraze was all about.

I will say with confidence about that aspect of the story is that there is a consistency in the tale. I also cannot say definitively if Namphaise ever was a soldier under Charlemagne. He could have been because there were thousands of men who served in Charlemagne's armies during his reign. Then again, maybe that claim about Namphaise was all about resume padding. We may never know for certain. We can only say that the legends about him includes a consistent mention of him being a former soldier for Charlemagne, and at least one source mentions the defeat at Roncevaux.

Regardless of the truth or truthiness to the legend of Saint Namphaise, it felt incredible to have that historic site all to ourselves.

No crowds.

No vendors trying to sell us something.

Nothing, but peace and quiet.

We then left in search of lunch and the next abbey associated with Saint Namphaise. Once we returned to our car we looked through the trees and saw what we had missed before.

The abbey.

Then we left Gouffrey de Lantouy, but not before my husband stated his opinion.



Next time I will show you the abbey at Marchilhac-sur-Célé and tell you about my search for the tomb of Saint Namphaise.

Linda