The
Castle of Beaucaire was built over the site of the Roman
Ugernum and was later the Merovingian capital
of Pagus Argenteus - The Land of Silver. It overlooks
the River
Rhône, the traditional border with Provence, with
Tarascon lying on the Provençal side.
It
was here, in an eleventh century castle, that King
Richard I of England gave his sister Jeanne
of England in marriage to Raymond
VI of Toulouse; and it was here, a year later, in July
1197 that Jeanne
gave birth to Raymondet,
the future Count
Raymond VII of Toulouse.
During the Albigensian Crusades which started a decade later, Beaucaire fell to the French Catholic Crusaders. As elsewhere in the Midi, the inhabitants loathed their new masters. Even after Pope Innocent III purported to dispossess Raymond VI as Count of Toulouse and confirmed Simon de Montfort as his replacement at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1216, they would still wholeheartedly support their sovereign Count against the combined might of western Christendom.
The
pope had reserved Provence, including Beaucaire, for the
young
Raymond, but Simon
de Montfort did not always obey God's representative
on Earth, if the pope's instructions did not suit his own
interests.Raymondet
would have to take Beaucaire by force from the crusader
army.
Raymond VI and Raymondet travelled separately from the Fourth Lateran Council to Genoa. There they met up and rode together to Marseilles where they were heartened by their welcome and the words of a loyal delegation from Avignon. Raymond VI now carried on for Aragon to talk to his allies there. Raymondet left for Beaucaire. It was on the way that Guy de Cavaillon spoke these famous words about paratge - the high civilisation of the Midi - to the young Raymondet:
"...the Count of Montfort who destroys men, he and the Church at Rome and the preachers are covering paratge with shame. They have cast it down from its high place, and if you do not raise it up, it will vanish for ever. If worth and paratge do not rise again through you, then paratge will die - with it the whole world will die. You are the true hope of all paratge and the choice is yours: either you show valour, or paratge dies!" (The Song of the Crusade (Canso de la crozada), Laisse ???)
Raymondet replied that any leopard that attacked him would find that he was fighting a lion, and so it was to prove.
In
late April 1216 Raymond, just 18 years old, began his siege
of Beaucaire, attracting supporting forces from far and
wide. The French defenders were lead by Lambert
de Croissy (now "Lambert de Limoux") but their
position was difficult since, without hesitation, the population
opened the gates of the town to their sovereign's son. "Our
dear Lord is entering the town in joy, and now we shall
be rid of the Barrois and the French!" (The
Canso
de la crozada laisse 156. Barrois were vassals
of the Count
of Bar).
As
in many places, the castle
at Beaucaire was a sort of citadel
within a fortified
town. (You can see a good example of this common design,
still surviving, at Carcassonne).
The French rode out of the castle
to regain the town, but the fighting was intense. Raymondet's
forces, shouting their war-cry "Tolosa!", were
well prepared: "Darts, lances and stones they flung,
bolts, arrows, axes, hatchets; they fought with spears,
with swords, with clubs and staves. They pressed de Montfort's
men so hard, levering dressed stones down onto them from
the windows, shattering shield bosses and poitrels, delivering
mortal blows, that they put them to flight and forced them
to take unwilling refuge in the castle" (The
Song of the Crusade laisse 156).
The Barrois and the French were now confined, but safe enough from further attack. Raymondet had a palisade built to neutralise the French cavalry. Trapped in the castle, war horses - and knights - were useless. Raymond Gaucelm gave Raymondet some advice, to build a new wall with brattices and a barbican, with a catapult at each opening. As so often during this period, the dedication of the meridional forces was striking. Knights carried infill to build the walls, rare enough in itself, but so did their ladies. Noble girls carried timber and dressed stone.
Then Raymondet built a battering ram to assault the castle.
Guy
de Montfort and Amaury
de Montfort (Simon's bother and son) arrived to assist
the French troops and relieve the castle.
By the time they got there Raymondet
was well entrenched in the town with his additional defences.
Worse still for the French, Raymondet
was still building, not just fortifications, but mangonels,
bitches
(gousas - similar to mangonels) and other siege weapons.
Lambert
de Limoux, isolated in the castle, could only watch
as Raymondet's
troops fetched more stones. They were building a wall
outside the castle's
outer walls
to contain it and isolate it from the rest of the town.
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On 5th June Simon de Montfort himself arrived from Paris with fresh troops and mercenaries, but no siege engines. Inside the town, Raymondet was already using his massive iron-capped battering ram to smash down the walls of the citadel. His forces had supplies. So did de Montfort's Crusader army outside. Lambert and his men inside the citadel did not. Simon de Montfort tried to take the town, apparently in open battle. As the The Song of the Crusade, laisse 161 tells us: |
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... Then came the roar of shouting and the charge; joyfully the horns rang out; trumpets and shrill clarions resounded all along the riverbank and field.
The crusaders spurred, and charged as one into the thickest of the array, but the men of Beaucaire took their assault well. Now came the clash of blades from Cologne and twice-tempered steel, of round headed maces and chilled javelins, well-honed axes and shining shields, came flights of darts, arrows and polished quarrels, feathered shafts and brandished spears, came brave knights, alert and active, sergeants, archers eagerly advancing, and the other companies, keen to strike hard. On all sides the rush and crash of men and weapons shook the field, riverbank and the solid ground.
Count Simon, Sir Alan [de Roucy] and Sir Foucaud [de Berzey] with Sir Guy [de Montfort] and Sir Peter Mir bore the shock of the encounter. What damaged hauberks you would have seen there, what good shields cracked and broken, what fists, legs and feet cut off, what spattered blood and skulls split apart! Even the simplest mind could not but feel it. But the men of Beaucaire had the upper hand and drove the crusaders down the beaten track; although they resisted strongly and there was not much pursuit. Many were the horses you would have seen running loose, iron-clad, riderless, their masters fallen and killed...
Both
sides retired - the Crusaders
to their encampment, Raymondet's
forces to the town. Simon
de Montfort held a council of war. As well as his nobles
he had three bishops and as the
Song of the Crusade laisse 162 puts it "I don't
know how many abbots" . Raymondet
seems to have held his own Council, but without the aid
of senior Churchmen - a disadvantage, for at this period
Catholic churchmen were the recognised masters of siege
engineering. Simon
de Montfort decided to build siege
engines - a belfry
and a cat
"built of iron, timber and leather" and manned
day and night. He also built a catapult
to shoot all day at the town's gateway.
On his side Raymondet
decided to cut off water supplies to de
Montfort's forces ( Lambert's
of course were already isolated from all water supplies).
Simon's catapult was a real threat, but his belfry and cat seem to have had little impact: "... these have no more effect than an enchanter's dream, they are a spider's web and a sheer waste of material. His catapult, though, throws strongly and is breaking down the whole gateway...". Simon de Montfort needed a quick victory. Ravens and vultures circled his men in the summer heat. Famously, the defenders in the citadel raised a black flag, the traditional flag of the Angel of Death, to signal to de Montfort that they could not hold out much longer.
More Councils of war followed. Simon de Montfort's troops and Simon himself started to wonder how God could fail to support him, when the Catholic Church was so clearly behind him. They also started to think about Raymondet's high birth - they recalled that Richard Coeur de Lion was his uncle and Bertrand, Count of Toulouse, his ancestor. In medieval society this counted for much. Perhaps they were fighting on the wrong side. French crusaders started to desert, while fresh local reinforcements continued to join Raymondet.
The people of Beaucaire worked to overcome the Crusaders in the citadel, using their battering ram.: "... long, straight, sharp and shod with iron; it thrust, carved and smashed till the wall was breached and many of the dressed stones thrown down. When the besieged Crusaders saw that, they did not panic but made a rope lasso and used a device to fling it so that they caught and held the ram's head, to the rage of all in Beaucaire. Then the engineer who had set up the battering ram arrived. He and his men slipped secretly into the rock itself [presumably the hole already made by the ram], intending to break through the wall with their sharp picks. But when the men in the keep realised this, they cast down fire, sulphur and tow together in a piece of cloth and let it down on a chain. When the fire caught and the sulphur ran, the flames and stench so stupefied them that not one of them could stay there. Then they used their stone throwers and broke down the beams and palisades." (The Song of the Crusade, laisse 164).
Food
and water had run out in Lambert's citadel. One of the commanders
waved a napkin and an empty bottle to signify their distress.
This invited another attack on the town by de
Montfort, but he was again unsuccessful. The slaughter
was massive. Afterwards Sir
Alain de Roucy ventured a joke: "By God, Sir Count,
we can set up a butcher's shop! Our sharp swords have won
us so much meat, it won't cost a penny to feed the cat".
But Simon was not amused. As the weeks stretched into months,
between these large-scale encounters his men were being
picked off by crossbowmen and his supplies were running
low even outside the town: "Our stores and granaries
are empty, we haven't a sack of any kind of grain, and our
horses are so hungry they're eating wood and the bark of
trees".
Again, questions were asked about why God was supporting the wrong side. The mood darkened and there was talk of having to eat the horses and then of having to eat each other. As Simon was conducting yet another Council of War a beggar burst in, shouting that he had seen a weasel. This was disturbing news. A weasel was a siege engine - similar to a cat, but smaller. The weasel was already against the citadel wall and ready to drive a spike into it. Once again the French engineers were up to the job. The chief engineer hurled a pot of molten pitch, hitting the weasel in exactly the right spot. It burst into flames.
Another
pitched battle followed, again Simon
de Montfort failing to carry the day. He called yet
another Council of War. His position was parlous. If he
carried on he would certainly fail and his garrison in the
citadel would perish. Yet if he lifted the siege, his reputation,
credibility and future would all be called into question.
Sir
Hugh de Lacy pointed up the unique situation: "I
have never seen a siege like this one: the besieged are
happy, sheltered and at ease, they have good bread, fresh
water, good beds and lodging, and Genestet wine [a local
wine] on tap, whereas we're out here exposed to every danger,
with nothing to call our own but heat, sweat and dust, muddy
watered wine and hard bread made without salt ..."
(Canso
de la crozada 169).
One final battle was planned, this time with a surprise ambush, but once again the enterprise failed. After another scene of carnage, this time with hot lime being thrown down from the parapets, Simon addressed his barons: "My lords, God has shown me by the clearest evidence that I am out of my mind. Once I was rich, great and valiant, but now my affairs have turned to nothing, for now neither force, cunning nor courage can rescue my men or get them out of Beaucaire. Yet if I abandon the siege so shamefully, all over the world they will call me recreant." His men in the citadel were dying now, and there was nothing he could do about it.
Through
Sir
Dragonet, an intermediary, Simon
de Montfort parleyed with the young Raymondet.
Raymondet held the whip hand. He could afford to wait until
Lambert's men died or surrendered, and until de
Montfort's men slunk off in disgrace. More gracious
than he needed to be, Raymondet
let the dying garrison go free allowing Simon to lift his
siege with a vestige of honour. Nevertheless, this event
marked the beginning of the end for de
Montfort. Heartened by events at Beaucaire the City
of Toulouse had rebelled and expelled the French invaders.
Even now local men, women and children were rebuilding their
city walls - a massive feat of engineering that no-one had
thought possible in the time available. Simon would now
have to besiege the city, and he would die outside the city
walls there within two years, as brave as ever, commanding
another unsuccessful siege.
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As for Raymondet, he had earned his spurs. Now aged 19 he had already exceeded the military prowess of his sixty year old father. The flower of paratge was in full bloom. The writer of the Canso de la crozada, gave him a review at laisse 171 that any Medieval reader would have regarded as the very highest praise: "... Beaucaire remained in the hands of Raymond, Count, Marquis and Duke, for he was a valiant, wise and clever man, courteous, of excellent lineage and powerful kin, related to the noble House of France and to the good king of England." |
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Despite
his military prowess, Raymondet
- the future Raymond VII, had no way to fight against
the papal arsenal of other weapons. By diplomacy and the
simple expedient of denying him a divorce, the pope ensured
that Raymond's territories would pass by inheritance to
the King of France.
The fortress at Beaucaire was rebuilt after the annexation of Languedoc to France (1272) under the Treaty of Meax (1229). The new castle was attacked by the English (and Italians) in 1385 during the Hundred Years' War, and was damaged on several occasions during the Wars of Religion in the Seventeenth century.
It
was slighted
on the orders of Richelieu in 1632 but was later restored.
Today, the castle at Beaucaire is open to the public. Little
remains of the eleventh century castle, the style being
more representative of French building in the later middle
ages, with its massive machicolations
on the keep.
Napoleon famously dined at Beaucaire in 1793 - see below.
You
can visit the castle, now in the Gard
département, which includes an unusual triangular
keep. There is a view of the tiled rooftops of the town
Beaucaire, the marshes of Camargue
to the north, and Tarascon and the hills of Provence across
the River
Rhône. Les Aigles de Beaucaire (the eagles of
Beaucaire) is a display of free flying eagles from the castle
keep. It takes place year-round (except in December). Also
there, you will find the Auguste-Jaquet Museum, containing
2000-year-old Gallo-Roman
artefacts and Provençal costumes and household articles.
Napoleon Bonaparte and his Supper at Beaucaire in 1793
As a young artillery captain Napoleon was sent in 1793 to convey gunpowder to the Italian army. In the Midi he was caught up in a Federalist insurrection.
Troops of the Marseilles National Guard had taken the city of Avignon, an important ammunition depot, and had allegedly massacred thirty civilians. On July 24, Napoleon took part in General Jean Carteaux's successful attempt to retake this city. There Napoleon witnessed the horrors of civil war. His own troops shot and killed national guardsmen and civilians.
A few days later, the 28th July 1793, he was staying at the house of M. Renaudet, a pharmacist at Beaucaire. That evening he dined at an auberge with four merchants visiting the fair at Beaucaire. During the course of dinner he defended the principles of the Revolution to his companions. After this dinner (supposedly the next day) he wrote a text in the form of a dinner-table discussion imitating a Socratic dialogue, called Le Souper de Beaucaire, (The Supper at Beaucaire) in which he professed his Republican beliefs and attempted to convince his readers of the necessity of the Revolution and the horrors of civil war such as he had recently witnessed at Avignon.
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He addressed his pamphlet to the representatives of the National Convention, who agreed to pay for it to be published. The dialogue is between Napoleon, who played the part of a soldier representing the Jacobin point of view, two merchants from Marseilles who took up the cause of the Marseilles National Guard, and two civilians from the region, a man from Nimes and a manufacturer from Montpellier. Perhaps not surprisingly, the dialogue is not evenly balanced, the soldiers part being given better arguments, crisper delivery and most of the talking. The last two civilians acted as "impartial" contributors to the discussion by directing the conversation and encouraging the Marseilles men to reach Republican conclusions. Napoleon's pamphlet in turn inspired a painting, also called Le Souper de Beaucaire, (The Supper at Beaucaire), shown here on the right. Napoleon is the artillery captain (capitaine d'artillerie) facing the others The text of Le Souper de Beaucaire or the Supper at Beaucaire, can be found in: |
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- Chapter 2 of Napoleon on Napoleon: An Autobiography of the Emperor
- Christopher Frayling's Napoleon Wrote Fiction, containing Frayling's translation of the Supper at Beaucaire.
- Google Books - page 60 of Steven Englund, Naoleon, A Political Life
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