The Treasure of Montsegur
I have eclectic tastes when it comes to non-fiction reading. My special interests are history and biography. I tended to focus mainly on Australia and Southern Africa, but I’ve deliberately broadened the geographic spread in recent years.
Books that I’m currently reading cover the early Christian Gnostic Gospels and Eleanor of Aquitaine’s biography.
Eleanor was a remarkable woman and probably would have been great in any era. She was married to the King of France, but they obtained (purchased) a divorce on the grounds of being cousins despite already having a daughter. Eleanor was a prize catch, commanding in her own right the affluent Duchy of Aquitaine. She married Henry II of England, who was also the Duke of Normandy, and between them they were tremendously powerful.
Her Duchy included the Languedoc region in the south of France, where a Christian sect called the Cathars flourished. After Eleanor’s time the Cathars were branded heretics and a brutal Crusade waged against them. I have a non-fiction book on this period waiting to be read.
My last Robert Goddard fiction included a brief reference to the Cathars in relation to the Knights Templar. There’s a myth that the Knights smuggled great holy relics from Jerusalem and these were held by the Cathars, who were effectively exterminated after the siege of Montsegur in 1244. The treasure has never been found.
While browsing a bookshop recently I came across a novel by Sophie Burnham called the Treasure of Montsegur. It claimed to be “a novel of the Cathars” and pricked my interest.
Having just finished that book I’m sorry to say I don’t know much more about the Cathar faith than I did before, or no more than any reader could learn from a good encyclopaedia.
As literature the book was well written, albeit meandering in style. It’s written in the first person as the account of a Cathar woman named Jeanne who survived the siege and helped hide the treasure. It crosses between her past and present, which is sometimes confusing.
The Cathars believed that Satan created the world and that humans were fallen angels striving to regain God’s grace. They were vegetarian and had different levels of faith, similar to the caste system we know today in the Hindu and Buddhist religions.
They espoused equality for women and were basically a gentle people. Followers of the highest level were called “perfects” and their supporters were “Good Christians”. During the Crusade and subsequent Inquisition their greatest weakness proved an inability to lie. They admitted their heresy and were promptly burnt at the stake.
If Catharism existed today it would be regarded as a curious exotic sect.
Jeanne’s story follows her flight from Montsegur with three perfects. She was meant to lead them to the cave where the relics and gold were hidden so they might escape to Lombardy and carry on the faith.
She unbelievably gets distracted and leaves the gentle monks to their fate. She then runs and hides, narrowly escaping Inquisitors, before meeting a widowed farmer named Jerome, who takes her in.
Jerome knows her background, but like many common people is ambivalent about the heresy and has no personal objection to the Good Christians. He’s also aware that people are tortured and burnt by association. He grapples with desire for the treasure, his sense of right and his Catholic faith.
Jeanne, meanwhile, first comes to the conclusion that the perfects she helped escape from Montsegur were the real “treasure” rather than gold and relics. Later, as she fears for her life, she receives the Cathar sacrament of the light of God and knows that the “treasure” is her immortal soul.
Jeanne dies on the rack before she can be burnt at the stake.
This book was a total change of pace for me, and it may be I’m unfairly critical because of this.
As an historical novel, I felt it didn’t transport me effectively to the 13th century. Well researched, the author may have erred on the side of caution in wanting to be historically accurate. Her descriptions could have been more vivid.
Some parts of the story were simply incredible, such as Jeanne’s disappearance from the perfects, and a futuristic prophecy that foreshadowed today’s world.
Don’t be dissuaded from reading this book. Just don’t expect to be illuminated upon completion.
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I totally disagree! I just finished this morning and although the end was very sad, in a way it wasn’t because Jeanne achieved hapiness. I am using this book for the second part of my year 12 supporting study in English Studies and i am only disappointed that i didn’t choose it for my first book. For my first book i used ‘the name of the rose’, and i have to say i didn’t enjoy it much. Have you read it and, if so, what did you think?
I’m afraid I haven’t read “The Name of the Rose”.