The Curse of the Loveliest Ladies of the Land...

The second instalment on the legends of Saurimonde has to do more with seers and than with faeries, although an element still remains. Her treasure of the golden comb seems to be one of the connective features underlying all the stories and traditions. It is probably not coincidental that in the legend Saurimonde shares traits and characteristic very similar to those if the 'witch goddess' Mari in Basque mythology. Basque country is situated on the other end of the Pyrenees and it is more than likely that those stories travelled and adapted themselves nicely to existing medieval Occitan cosmology.

The former Cathar stronghold of Lastours is a stones throw from Carcassonne and was the former home of the medieval witch version of Saurimonde and the notorious Loba the she-wolf of Cabaret, reputed to be the loveliest woman in the Languedoc and one of the chatelaines of the 'Courts of Love' held in the castle of Puivert. The troubadours would have sung her praises just as the tales of Saurimonde would have been told in hushed tones, in dark corners in the dead of night.

Curiously enough, there was an interesting novel by Joseph Dovetto, 'Salimonde Lastours, the Cathar Naiad', in which the roles of these two mythical women are blended and reversed. The book is inspired by the legend of the cave of Saurimonde at Lastours castle. Saurimonde was called by protestant minister and one of the first chroniclers of the Albigensian Crusade, Napoleon Peyrat "the prophetess of the camp of the Hautpool faidits", writer and poet Maurice Magre described her as, "the solitary Saurimonde, the inspired prophetess of the Mazamet district, who went naked as in the days when the world was born, because her soul was as bright as the sun she invoked." The story starts out with two naiads or fees that guard a treasure that is made of double-silver, pearl and lapis-lazuli. Salimonde is blonde with blue eyes and loves the light, her sister Brun is dark-haired with ebony eyes and she loves the darkness and hatred. During the Visigoth invasions, Salimonde starts a relationship with a wounded warrior, Acco, that she has been treating. Her sentence for this illicit affair with a human is that she and her sister lose their otherworldly powers and are doomed back into existence through reincarnation.

In their next lives they find themselves cast into a bygone era of Cabaret just before the Albigensian

Crusade. Loba is reincarnated as Bruna, the new face of the devil and Nova de Cabaret as the

virtuous Salimonde. Nova warns about her aunt, "you should beware of her like the plague, my aunt

Etinette, wife of my Uncle Jourdain. She is unkind and even cruel. She is known as the wolf of

Pennautier, named so by poor troubadour Peire Vidal. You see her often dressed in a wolf skin. For

fun, the troubadour, who was the courtly lover of Etinette, disguised himself as a wolf during a

hunt. The dogs of the she wolf nearly devoured him."

The medieval folklore version of the Saurimonde tale tells quite a different story...

"Under the castle of Quertinheux (one of the castles of Lastours), north west of Grésilhou, overlooking the river, is situated a cave known as the 'Hole of the Witch'. The main opening sits almost flush with the water below. At the bottom of the cave, a rough stone staircase leads to the first floor in the north wall which opens to a large natural bay half closed by ivy.

This is where, according to tradition, lived Salimonde the witch. She had long hair that reached down to her feet and she was dressed in sheepskins. When it was Candlemas, she would appear at the opening of the cave. If she cried and lamented then winter was going to continue and increase its ferocity. On the contrary, if she blew her flute with joyful ease it meant that spring was just around the corner and that the seasons would be beautiful and sunny.

The superstitious villagers used to try and win her good graces by sacrificing two or three sheep to her.”

There exists another legend in the black mountain of the faery Saurimunda, who lived in the cave of Minouvre. “One day she dropped her golden comb into the river Arnette and predicted that the waters of the torrents would ride constantly with gold.”

Perhaps the basis for these stories is the legends of the Basque witch goddess, Mari. Not much is remembered of her as there exists no written accounts, but her reputation lived on through representation and oral tradition.

Mari was a central goddess who was associated with the various forces of nature including lightning, thunder and wind. She was known as the 'bringer of storms' who lived in a cave and often prophecised the weather. She was always dressed in red (as were all the high priestesses in the ancient tradition) and was often depicted with the full moon emitting flames behind her head. Although she has many animals attached to her, one of her main familiars is a black goat in which she would wear his skin for protection when he was not by her side. Most often, she is seen as a beautiful woman seated at the mouth of one of her caves, combing her long, lustrous hair with a golden comb. Legend has it that a woman stole into her cave one night and stole a golden comb. In the morning the woman's valuable tract of land was completely covered in stones. The women who served as the pagan high priestesses of her court were known as the lamia, or lamiak, or sorgiank. Sometimes they are referred to as witches, but in all the instances they possess large amounts of golden treasures and there is more than one story of a mortal stealing a golden comb from one of them and in retaliation they savagely hunt the person down and bring great harm and misfortune to them.

Portrayed in darkness and in light, taking on aspects of good and evil, reinterpreted and reimagined, the reputations of these powerful ladies lives on into modern day. The motif of the golden comb turns up in fairy tales from Greece with mortal kissed fairies whom weep during the full moon to Japan where is was worn by the loveliest lady of the land who lies crying in the moonlight, to pour the water of the dead. The one thing that these sotries have in common is that the possessing the golden comb often ends badly. Possibly it is a metaphor for trying to tame and imprison the wild nature which ends in a castle somewhere East of the Sun and West of the Moon. It seems that some gifts are not what they seem...

Saurimonde of the Faeries

Who can resist a medieval legend that incorporates witches, sirens, dryads and fairies, that is both angelic and demonic. Saurimonde was known as a prophetess, who roamed the fertile lands of Mazamet as naked as the sun, and as a sorceress who inhabited the trou, or cave under the castle of Quertinheux, part of Lastours, dressed in goat or sheep skins, with her hair touching the ground, who only came out at Candlemas to predict the future. If the weather was going to be foul and winter was to continue, she would cry and scream, but if she played her flute than spring was just around the corner. She was also known to be a beautiful faery who haunted the edges of the river and this is where our first legend begins...

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Saurimonde - She of the Golden Hair and the Golden Comb.

One evening the head archer of the house of Hautpoul on the Black Mountain, came upon the wild shores of the Arnette River. A vague uneasiness overtook him and he could not shake the feeling. His favorite past time was hunting and he possessed numerous of heads of wolves, boar and deer that he had slain. As the last rays of the sun began to fade a marvellous sight appears before him. A few feet away is a woman of stunning beauty. Her shoulders are covered by her golden hair as she joyfully plays in the currents with a child, her daughter, who is her picture image. In her hand is a golden comb, studded with jewels and diamonds so intricate that it could not have been made by mortals. .

The archer recognizes her as the faery Saurimonde. Few have ever seen her, but her beauty is legendary as is the golden comb, which is said to have been crafted by the devil and is the key to untold riches. The archer remembers the songs of the troubadours and how her name has been celebrated from the courts of the Count of Toulouse to Montpellier where the King of Aragon called his poets to praise her golden curls and golden comb.

While he watches, she leaves the cool, refreshing river, climbing up on a nearby rock with her child and she starts brushing her daughter's hair with the bejewelled comb. The archer makes a sudden move and Saurimonde and her child disappear into a garlanded honeysuckle which serves as their palace right before his eyes.

Later that night, the head archer paces the floor of the castle Hautpoul. He cannot shake the image of the beautiful faery woman and the overwhelming desire to possess the golden comb.

Time passes and the head archer becomes more and more obsessed by this vision. Hunting no longer holds any attraction for him, and his friends all flee, fearing that he is mad. But he never tells anyone his secret.

One anxious night, he takes down the cross bow that has been long since forgotten. Like a madman he runs down the steep slopes that slide away from the black walls of the city. He careens among the rocks and the bushes to the same place at the river that he stumbled upon years ago. To his ultimate surprise, she is there! He, the head archer, who has never missed his target, the cunning hunter who never returns empty-handed, raises his bow and the arrow goes sailing past her. She mocks his clumsy efforts to her daughter and they both laugh.

He returns again and again to attempt to steal the golden comb and always it is the same outcome. Finally, after being defeated at every turn, the head archer climbs up the steep path carved by large stone slabs to the church of St. Saveur. Meeting with the abbot, he confesses his story and asks just how he might attain the precious implement. The abbot tells him that indeed, she must be the daughter of the devil and that to obtain the golden comb he must take his bow to the cross of their good Count of Toulouse, which adorns the center of the city, and have it blessed.

After having made the journey, the head archers sets out for the river the next evening. Saurimonde is there, more beautiful than ever, her delightful body covered only with the lightest of veils and her golden hair flowing loose about her. She has no fear now and her clear, smiling eyes seek out her clumsy enemy.

A coldness descends and Saurimonde with comb in hand calls to her daughter to come out of the water. This is the chance that the head archer has been waiting for. With a fierce and greedy gleam in his eye, he sures his shot and then unleashes the strand. It flies through the air straight and true. Heavens! A cry is heard. Saurimonde wails as she throws the golden comb into the river's depths. She picks up the body of her child whose blood is spilling onto her pearly skin. Amidst her sobs she starts to curse the miserable head archer.

“Woe to you! Murderer of my child, you were once a great river and now you will become a trickle of a stream!”

No one ever saw her again...

The head archer tried in vain for the rest of his days to find the golden comb, but because of his crime he never did. Instead, he lost everything he had and descended into darkness and misery. The once bountiful river dried up to a small stream and then faded away into legend.

(Henri Tournier, Castle Aiguefonde by Mazamet-1899 - published in the Revue du Tarn, vol XVII, 1900).

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The heroine of the story that we are writing now is a lot more earthy, erotic and human (well, human in the the beginning), although she retains a love for the river and the ethereal seductiveness of the faery woman from whom her name comes. Next time we will tell the tale of Saurimonde the sorceress, a fascinating and terrifying legend that has interesting parallels with the Basque witch goddess Mari, queen of thunderstorms. 

picture by Rayvn Navarro

The Night Under a Thousand Stars at the Castle of Dreams - Montsegur

It wasn't an easy trek from the village and up the mountain to the castle. I stopped many times, the sweat pouring off of me in the late afternoon sun. I told myself that it was to look at the stunning views, but the reality was I needed to catch my breath. The courtyard of the castle was blessedly empty when I arrived and free of tourists. I went to my favorite spot just underneath the north facing tower or the dunjeon keep and sitting into the face of the setting sun wrote a whole scene for my new book until I lost the light. The creativity flows up there and its like the pen becomes an extension of my hand. I don't have to formulate or recalibrate, it just flows and flows in the moment. When I couldn't write any more I drew my knees up and stared into the darkening twilight. This is my favorite time of the day, the last exhalation before dark, just before the first star pops up in the night sky. You can feel this moment in your bones, in the land all around you and it is truly magical. My thoughts swirled out over the land and for a moment I realized that my heart, which had recently been literally punched out of my chest, didn't ache any more. It was enough to be there, to be filled with the beauty and tranquillity of the place. It was a gift and the tears ran down my face in relief. My thoughts ranged to the past and future blending as one as I contemplated on the meaning of eternity, trying to stretch my mind as far as the darkness would go. Then it was night and the I said hello to the first twinkling star.

Making my way to the old encampments I briefly wondered what time it was. Then I laughed. Time is irrelevant up here, it has no meaning whatsoever. The only time is the darkness. Settling myself into my bag on the ground, I watched the vast multitude of stars, picking out constellations and tracing the backbone of the Milky Way which was so clear.across the sky. I could feel the castle towering behind me, so warm and silent, like a giant sentinel. First there was one shooting star and I made a wish. Than another so I made another wish. The skies opened up as a shower of stars fell, so many that I couldn't keep up. I tried giving them classifications just for fun, but abandoned the thought as the light show became more intense. They were so close, it was like all I would have to do is raise my hand to grab one. As I lay there watching in wonder, my thoughts started to flee, my soul stretching out until there was nothing else, just me and the mountain and the stars streaking across the sky, like a thousand tiny jewels. The strangest thing was that it was familiar, that I had been in this very spot before and seen the exact same thing. Like I knew it was going to happen. I lost myself in that familiarity and just let myself be a part of the elements, a part of the night, a part of the infinity in each one of those stars. It started to taper off and I must have drifted into a dreamless sleep for a while.

The last calls of the owls woke me just before dawn, just as the tiniest line of light was brightening in the eastern sky. My head was still with the stars, still lost in other galaxies and other times, but as the sun rose and the skies became streaked with shades of pink, red and gold, I started to pay more attention. There have been many spectacular sunrises at Montsegur, but this one was on a scale that is almost indescribable it was so cosmic. The sun was so intensely red that it felt like being bathed in fire, like dawn was not just breaking, but it was victorious and charging into the day full throttle. Like a roaring beast that would not be denied. Then it softened and changed back into dawn and a regular day. It wasn't until I packed my bag and turned around that there were other people there watching as well. I never heard them come up through the courtyard and yet they were there, still as statues, completely enraptured at the sight. Smiling at them as I made my leave, I stood in the archway of the door and silently thanked the castle, thanked the mountain for the experience and letting me be a part of it. Then I happily made my way back down the trail..

I did manage to break out of the reverie and grab a couple of shots.

Baptismal of Fire....