What is A Tarn Bastide?
History Of Bastides In The Tarn
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| Lisle sur Tarn |
The history of the Tarn bastides, began in the 13th and 14th centuries, triggered by the tragic episode of the repression of the Cathars, the so-called Albigensian Crusade. The building of the bastides signalled the start of a period of commercial prosperity that lasted throughout the Middle Ages.
What is a bastide?
The bastides in the Tarn and Albigeois areas are evidence of conscious town planning which took into account the steep hill-sites, and indeed actively sought out such sites so as to construct fortified towns. A feeling of insecurity was still very much a sign of the times.
Bastides were also seats of power as well as commercial centres. Villeneuve-la-Vieille, today renamed Villeneuve-sur-Vère, was built in 1212 by Déodat Alaman, an adviser to the Count of Toulouse. It had fewer than thirty houses and no fortifications surrounding it.
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| Cordes-sur-Ciel |
By means of the bastides, which were most often built with fortifications such as Cordes-sur-Ciel or Castelnau de Montmiral, the baron or overlord provided safety but also new towns or ‘free towns’, that is, towns free of taxes, thereby providing their new inhabitants with a way of improving their social situation.
Looking at a plan of these towns, you will find that the streets have been laid out in a grid pattern, either concentrically or tapering.
At the heart of the medieval fortified town is the square, the crossroads for every meeting, exchange or transaction. The neighbouring streets lead into it at each corner, usually passing beneath arches built between the surrounding houses.
The Cathars Crusade and the Cathar heresy were certainly major reasons for the building of some of the bastides: Cordes (1222), Castelnau-de-Montmiral (1222), Labastide-Rouairoux (1224) and Lisle-sur-Tarn (1229-1230) , under the direction of Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse, who tried to protect the Cathars.
The crusaders, that is the armies on the Catholic side, were not daunted by Labastide-Monfort (nowadays known as Labastide de Lévis) or indeed by Labastide Saint Georges built by the Montfort family facing Lavaur, to which they were about to lay siege.
In the same period, Puycelsi was also given defensive fortifications.
After the Crusade, the various areas of the Tarn underwent a recovery that was part of a general economic development, itself giving rise to the building of further bastides: Lisle-sur-Tarn (1229), Villefranche d’Albigeois constructed in 1239 by Simon de Montfort’s nephew Philippe, St Sulpice (1247), Labessiere-Candeil (1255), Florentin (1260), the royal bastide of Réalmont (1272), Valence et Cadix (1279), Briatexte (1290), Pampelonne (1290)…
Subsequently this kind of architectural urban development went far beyond the confines of the Tarn region, spreading throughout the whole of south-west France.
Just 53 years after the end of the Albigensian Crusade, a start was made on the building of Albi’s cathedral under the ægis of the bishops of the Albigeois. Power was in new hands now…
Tarn and Spanish Links
Either because of close commercial links or because of the fortresses captured by French armies, the Bastides in the Tarn were given Spanish names such as Cadix (Cádiz), Valence (Valencia), Pampelonne (Pamplona) and even Cordes-sur-Ciel (Córdoba).
Bastides of The Tarn To Visit
Here is a list of the Bastides of the Tarn to visit.
Labastide de Lévis
Lisle-sur-Tarn
Villefranche d’Albigeois
St Sulpice
Labessiere-Candeil
Florentin
Réalmont
Valence et Cadix
Briatexte
Pampelonne
Puycelsi
Cordes-sur-Ciel
Castelnau-de-Montmiral
Labastide-Rouairoux
Lisle-sur-Tarn
Cadix
Valence
