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Rennes-le-Château
Rennes-le-Château (; ) is a commune approximately 5 km (3 miles) south of Couiza, in the Aude department in the Occitanie region in Southern France. This hilltop village is known internationally; it receives tens of thousands of visitors per year, drawn by conspiracy theories surrounding a putative buried treasure discovered by its 19th-century priest Bérenger Saunière, the precise nature of which is disputed among those who credit its existence. History Mountains frame both ends of the region—the Cévennes to the northeast and the Pyrenees to the south. The area is known for its scenery, with jagged ridges, deep river canyons and rocky limestone plateaus, with large caves underneath. Rennes-le-Château was the site of a prehistoric encampment, and later a Roman colony, or at least Roman villa or temple, such as is confirmed to have been built at Fa, west of Couiza, part of the Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis, the wealthiest part of Roman Gaul. Rennes-l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bérenger Saunière
François-Bérenger Saunière (11 April 1852 – 22 January 1917) was a Catholic Church in France, French Catholic priest in the village of Rennes-le-Château, in the Aude region. He was a central figure in the conspiracy theories surrounding the village, which form the basis of several documentaries and books such as the 1982 ''Holy Blood, Holy Grail'' by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh (author), Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln. Elements of these theories were later used by Dan Brown in his best-selling 2003 novel ''The Da Vinci Code'', in which the fictional character Jacques Saunière is named after the priest. Saunière served in Rennes-le-Château from 1885 until he was transferred to another village in 1909 by his bishop. He declined this nomination and subsequently resigned. From 1909 until his death in 1917, he was a non-stipendiary Free Priest (an independent priest without a parish, who did not receive any salary from the church because of suspension), and who from 191 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Couiza
Couiza (; ) is a commune in the Aude department in southern France. INSEE Couiza is a rural commune which has 1,122 inhabitants in 2020. It belongs to the urban unit of Espéraza. Its inhabitants are called Couizanais or Couizanaises. Couiza is located at the foothills of the , on the road between , going towards and |
Southern France
Southern France, also known as the south of France or colloquially in French as , is a geographical area consisting of the regions of France that border the Atlantic Ocean south of the Marais Poitevin,Louis Papy, ''Le midi atlantique'', Atlas et géographie de la France moderne, Flammarion, Paris, 1984. Spain, the Mediterranean Sea and Italy. It includes southern Nouvelle-Aquitaine in the west, Occitania in the centre, the southern parts of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes in the northeast, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur in the southeast, as well as the island of Corsica in the southeast. Southern France is generally considered part of southern Europe because of its association with the Mediterranean Sea. The colloquial French name for the region, ''le Midi'', is derived from an Old French compound composed of ''mi'' ("middle") and ''di'' ("day"), meaning literally "midday". Thus, the term is comparable in both origin and meaning to , which to indicates southern Italy, and Romanian whic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Count Of Toulouse
The count of Toulouse (, ) was the ruler of Toulouse during the 8th to 13th centuries. Originating as vassals of the Frankish kings, the hereditary counts ruled the city of Toulouse and its surrounding county from the late 9th century until 1270. The counts and other family members were also at various times counts of Quercy, Rouergue, Albi, and Nîmes, and sometimes margraves (military defenders of the Holy Roman Empire) of Septimania and Provence. Count Raymond IV founded the Crusader state of Tripoli, and his descendants were also counts there. They reached the zenith of their power during the 11th and 12th centuries, but after the Albigensian Crusade the county fell to the kingdom of France, nominally in 1229 and '' de facto'' in 1271. Later the title was revived for Louis Alexandre, Count of Toulouse, a bastard of Louis XIV (1678–1737). History Carolingian era During the youth of young Louis the Pious his tutor, Torson (sometimes Chorso or Choson), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions and has played a prominent role in the history and development of Western civilization.Gerald O'Collins, O'Collins, p. v (preface). The church consists of 24 Catholic particular churches and liturgical rites#Churches, ''sui iuris'' (autonomous) churches, including the Latin Church and 23 Eastern Catholic Churches, which comprise almost 3,500 dioceses and Eparchy, eparchies List of Catholic dioceses (structured view), around the world, each overseen by one or more Bishops in the Catholic Church, bishops. The pope, who is the bishop of Rome, is the Papal supremacy, chief pastor of the church. The core beliefs of Catholicism are found in the Nicene Creed. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cathars
Catharism ( ; from the , "the pure ones") was a Christian quasi- dualist and pseudo-Gnostic movement which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France, between the 12th and 14th centuries. Denounced as a heretical sect by the Catholic Church, its followers were attacked first by the Albigensian Crusade and later by the Medieval Inquisition, which eradicated the sect by 1350. Around 1 million were slaughtered, hanged, or burnt at the stake. Followers were known as Cathars or Albigensians, after the French city Albi where the movement first took hold, but referred to themselves as Good Christians. They famously believed that there were not one, but two Godsthe good God of Heaven and the evil god of this age (). According to tradition, Cathars believed that the good God was the God of the New Testament faith and creator of the spiritual realm. Many Cathars identified the evil god as Satan, the master of the physical world. The Cathars believe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spain
Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Europe and the fourth-most populous European Union member state. Spanning across the majority of the Iberian Peninsula, its territory also includes the Canary Islands, in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean, the Balearic Islands, in the Western Mediterranean Sea, and the Autonomous communities of Spain#Autonomous cities, autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, in mainland Africa. Peninsular Spain is bordered to the north by France, Andorra, and the Bay of Biscay; to the east and south by the Mediterranean Sea and Gibraltar; and to the west by Portugal and the Atlantic Ocean. Spain's capital and List of largest cities in Spain, largest city is Madrid, and other major List of metropolitan areas in Spain, urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heresy
Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, particularly the accepted beliefs or religious law of a religious organization. A heretic is a proponent of heresy. Heresy in Heresy in Christianity, Christianity, Heresy in Judaism, Judaism, and Bid‘ah, Islam has at times been met with censure ranging from excommunication to the death penalty. Heresy is distinct from apostasy, which is the explicit renunciation of one's religion, principles or cause; and from blasphemy, which is an impious utterance or action concerning God or sacred things. Heresiology is the study of heresy. Etymology Derived from Ancient Greek ''haíresis'' (), the English ''heresy'' originally meant "choice" or "thing chosen". However, it came to mean the "party, or school, of a man's choice", and also referred to that process whereby a young person would examine various philosophies to determine how to live. The word ''heresy'' is usually used within a C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albigensian Crusades
The Albigensian Crusade (), also known as the Cathar Crusade (1209–1229), was a military and ideological campaign initiated by Pope Innocent III to eliminate Catharism in Languedoc, what is now southern France. The Crusade was prosecuted primarily by the French crown and promptly took on a political aspect. It resulted in the significant reduction of practicing Cathars and a realignment of the County of Toulouse with the French crown. The distinct regional culture of Languedoc was also diminished. The Cathars originated from an anti-materialist reform movement within the Bogomil churches of the Balkans calling for what they saw as a return to the Christian message of perfection, poverty and preaching, combined with a rejection of the physical. The reforms were a reaction against the often perceived scandalous and dissolute lifestyles of the Catholic clergy. Their theology, Gnostic in many ways, was basically dualist. Several of their practices, especially their belief in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Communes Of France
A () is a level of administrative divisions of France, administrative division in the France, French Republic. French are analogous to civil townships and incorporated municipality, municipalities in Canada and the United States; ' in Germany; ' in Italy; ' in Spain; or civil parishes in the United Kingdom. are based on historical geographic communities or villages and are vested with significant powers to manage the populations and land of the geographic area covered. The are the fourth-level administrative divisions of France. vary widely in size and area, from large sprawling cities with millions of inhabitants like Paris, to small hamlet (place), hamlets with only a handful of inhabitants. typically are based on pre-existing villages and facilitate local governance. All have names, but not all named geographic areas or groups of people residing together are ( or ), the difference residing in the lack of administrative powers. Except for the Municipal arrondissem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Septimania
Septimania is a historical region in modern-day southern France. It referred to the western part of the Roman province of '' Gallia Narbonensis'' that passed to the control of the Visigoths in 462, when Septimania was ceded to their king, Theodoric II. During the Early Middle Ages, the region was variously known as Gallia Narbonensis, Gallia, or Narbonensis. The territory of Septimania roughly corresponds with the modern French former administrative region of Languedoc-Roussillon that merged into the new administrative region of Occitanie. In the Visigothic Kingdom, which became centred on Toledo by the end of the reign of Leovigild, Septimania was both an administrative province of the central royal government and an ecclesiastical province whose metropolitan was the Archbishop of Narbonne. Originally, the Goths may have maintained their hold on the Albigeois, but if so it was conquered by the time of Chilperic I. There is archaeological evidence that some enclaves of Visi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Monarchy
France was ruled by monarchs from the establishment of the kingdom of West Francia in 843 until the end of the Second French Empire in 1870, with several interruptions. Classical French historiography usually regards Clovis I, king of the Franks (), as the first king of France. However, historians today consider that such a kingdom did not begin until the establishment of West Francia, after the fragmentation of the Carolingian Empire in the 9th century. Titles The kings used the title "King of the Franks" () until the late twelfth century; the first to adopt the title of "King of France" (Latin: ''Rex Franciae''; French language, French: ''roi de France'') was Philip II of France, Philip II in 1190 (r. 1180–1223), after which the title "King of the Franks" gradually lost ground. However, ''Francorum Rex'' continued to be sometimes used, for example by Louis XII in 1499, by Francis I of France, Francis I in 1515, and by Henry II of France, Henry II in about 1550; it was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
