Bernard Clergue was the town '' bayle'' of the village of

Montaillou Montaillou (; oc, Montalhon) is a commune in the Ariège department in the south of France. Its original, medieval location was abandoned and the current village is a short distance away. History The village is best known for being the su ...

in the south of France in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. A great deal about his life is recorded in the

Fournier Register The Fournier Register is a set of records from the inquisition into heresy run by Jacques Fournier, Bishop of Pamiers between 1318 and 1325. Fournier was later to become Pope Benedict XII. Interrogation Fournier interrogated hundreds of individu ...

and has been studied by historians, most notably

Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie Emmanuel Bernard Le Roy Ladurie (, born 19 July 1929) is a French historian whose work is mainly focused upon Languedoc in the ''Ancien Régime'', particularly the history of the peasantry. One of the leading historians of France, Le Roy Ladurie h ...

in his book ''

''. Bernard was a member of the powerful Clergue family, the wealthiest in the village. He was the son of Pons and Mengarde Clergue and the brother of Pierre Clergue. While Pierre became the village priest, and thus the local representative of the church, Bernard became the bayle, the representative of the government. The bayle was the tax collector and the main enforcer of law and order in the town, reporting to the

châtelain Châtelain (from la, castellanus, derived from ''castellum''; pertaining to a castle, fortress. Middle English: '' castellan'' from Anglo-Norman: ''castellain'' and Old French: ''castelain'') was originally the French title for the keeper of a c ...

who ruled to town for the

Comté de Foix The County of Foix (french: Comté de Foix, ; oc, Comtat de Fois) was an independent medieval fief in southern France, and later a province of France, whose territory corresponded roughly the eastern part of the modern ''département'' of Ari� ...

. While Bernard was one of the few educated and literate people in the town he was still a

peasant A peasant is a pre-industrial agricultural laborer or a farmer with limited land-ownership, especially one living in the Middle Ages under feudalism and paying rent, tax, fees, or services to a landlord. In Europe, three classes of peasants ...

and most of his work was farming. As bayle he farmed not only his own land, but also that of the Comté. This included the land seized from Cathar heretics. As with the rest of the family Bernard himself was a staunch

Cathar Catharism (; from the grc, καθαροί, katharoi, "the pure ones") was a Christian dualist or Gnostic movement between the 12th and 14th centuries which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France. Follow ...

, but was for a long time protected by his wealth and connections. While not as great a womanizer as his brother Pierre, Bernard did father a child out of wedlock: Mengarde Clergue, who later married Raymond Aymeric of

Prades d'Aillon Prades may refer to: Places ;France * Prades, Ardèche, in the Ardèche ''département'', France * Prades, Ariège, in the Ariège ''département'', France * Prades, Haute-Loire, in the Haute-Loire ''département'', France * Prades, Pyrénées-Orie ...

. Bernard later fell deeply in love with Raymonde Belot, whom he married. Pierre was the unquestioned leader of the family and Bernard was devastated when he was arrested by the

inquisition The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...

. Bernard reported that he had lost his "god" and his "ruler". He thus went to great ends to try to free Pierre, including dispensing some 14,000

sous The Sous region (also spelt Sus, Suss, Souss or Sousse) ( ar, سوس, sūs, shi, ⵙⵓⵙ, sus) is an area in mid-southern Morocco. Geologically, it is the alluvial basin of the Sous River (''Asif n Sus''), separated from the Sahara desert ...

in bribes, a great deal of money at the time. Bernard himself was arrested by the inquisition in 1324, after a month in prison he died in the summer of that year.

References

*Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. ''Montaillou: The Promised Land of Error.'' translated by

Barbara Bray Barbara Bray (née Jacobs; 24 November 1924 – 25 February 2010) was an English translator and critic. Early life Bray was born in Maida Vale, London; her parents had Belgian and Jewish origins. An identical twin (her sister Olive Classe was al ...

. New York: G. Braziller, c1978. {{DEFAULTSORT:Clergue, Bernard 13th-century French people 14th-century French people People from Montaillou