"Les Chevaliers Cathares” (The Cathar Knights/Horsemen), 1983 (Album: “Quelqu’un de l’intérieur”)
Cathar Towns & Castles
This song builds on two levels of historic reality. The first is the medieval religious sect of Cathars (also known as Albigensians from the town of Albi where many congregated) that emerged in Germany around 1143 and spread to southern France between the 12th and 14th centuries.
By the 12th century, the Catholic Church had developed a strong organization and an orthodox doctrine that was simple enough to attract members and strong enough to keep them entwined in a nest of doctrines, rituals, images and accouterments. Catharism, by contrast, relied on itinerant preachers and an ascetic (dualist) vision that advocated a “catharsis” of material trappings and a return to “purity” (Greek “katharos” means “pure”). This rejection of the material world was an existential challenge to the Catholic Church which had both feet planted solidly in it.
Occasioned by the murder of papal legate Pierre de Castelnau in 1208, Pope Innocent III denounced the Cathars as heretical. In 1209, he launched the Albigensian Crusade, pitting Catholics from northern France led by Simon de Montfort (5th Earl of Leicester) against Cathars in the south. The image below depicts the Pope on the left excommunicating the Cathars and on the right the Crusaders deliver them to their fate. The juxtaposition of these images intimates a revealing nexus between religious authority and secular power.
Crusading
The 20-year long Albigensian Crusade ruthlessly sieged and sacked a series of castles and towns throughout Languedoc. It proceeded in a spirit that reflected a famous (but likely apocryphal) phrase attributed to Cistercian Abbot Arnaud Amalric. When asked how to identify Cathars from Catholics, he reportedly said: “Kill them all. God knows his own.” Crusaders massacred thousands of people by a combination of burning at the stake in huge bonfires, mass burial in mud graves, and Inquisition. Medieval justice maintained a hierarchy of methods of execution depending on the crime and it reserved burning for heretics. The largest of these immolations occurred in 1244 at Montségur, Languedoc. The Cathars were easy prey due to their belief in non-violence and estimates of those killed during the campaign range up to a million people, who often accepted their fate while singing hymns. Many deaths were not even Cathars, but collateral damage. Not coincidentally, while its direct purpose was to suppress the Cathar heresy, the Albigensian Crusade also helped the French monarchy consolidate control over a large and previously fragmented region of multiple kingdoms, duchies, languages and allegiances.
Although scholarship does not substantiate any conspiratorial link between Cathars and the contemporaneous troubadours that we celebrate on this website, it is worth noting that troubadour poetry and song elevated the image of women in ways more characteristic of Cathar practices than those of the Catholic Church of the time. The troubadours’ affection for the motifs of the damsel-in-distress and courtly love diverged from the prevailing practice of arranged marriages that were frequently sanctioned by the Church. This was just one of many complicated dimensions of the relationship between troubadours and Catholicism.
Les Chevaliers Cathares
The second historical reality that inspired Cabrel's song is a monumental cement sculpture named “Les Chevaliers Cathares” by artist Jacques Tissinier. This sculpture was installed in 1980 on the side of the "Deux Mers" motorway (A10) outside Narbonne in southern France. It was one of many monumental “artworks” purchased and installed during the 1980s and 1990s alongside motorways, pursuant to a French law that required 1% of the cost of infrastructure projects to be allocated to “culture.” The purpose of this “autoroute art” was to celebrate local cultural traditions. Tissinier's sculpture consists of three cartoonish cement “knights,” each 13 meters tall, and their shields. French art historian Thomas Schlesser described "Les chevaliers" as a “pathetic spectacle of three vague bunkers in white cement and sandblasted quartz aggregate” that “borders on the ridiculous.”
Of course, Cabrel is born, bred and resident in "Occitanie" and he has something to say. His song includes a tongue-in-cheek put-down of the brutalist sculpture when he says that “Les chevaliers…pleurant doucement au bord de l’autoroute” (“the knights...cry softly nearby the roadway”). He says what he really feels about the sculpture (as well as the central government) when he sings: “C'est quelqu'un au-dessus de la Loire Qui a dû dessiner les plans” (“Someone north of the Loire must have designed the plans”). On the other hand, he includes a poetic commemoration of the "clash of arms," the "flames licking the walls" and the "mass graves" of the massacres that decimated the Cathars and ravaged their lands.
Despite the historical realities described above, there remains considerable misconception regarding the Cathars. The very term “Cathar Knights” is an oxymoron because the Cathars themselves were pacifist. Their beliefs and practices were much more complicated than commonly understood. They had no founder or designated leader, and made an “inkblot” appearance in many regions in Europe. Much of what tourist agencies in France promote today as “Cathar trails” or “Cathar castles” is smoke and mirrors concocted for commercial purposes.
The song has 8 stanzas, each with 4 lines except the first and last. The first and last verses have the same lyrics and include the song’s main message. Much of the rhyming is ABAB. The chords are simple and stable throughout, with each verse repeating a sequence of only 4 chords--D, G, A and Bm. There is no salient refrain, chord or bridge but it is an addictive melody and an interesting story.
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Les chevaliers Cathares Pleurent doucement Au bord de l'autoroute Quand le soir descend Comme une dernière insulte Comme un dernier tourment Au milieu du tumulte En robe de ciment La fumée des voitures Les cailloux des enfants Les yeux sur les champs de torture Et les poubelles devant C'est quelqu'un au-dessus de la Loire Qui a dû dessiner les plans Il a oublié sur la robe Les tâches de sang On les a sculptés dans la pierre Qui leur a cassé le corps Le visage dans la poussière De leur ancien trésor Sur le grand panneau de lumière Racontez aussi leur mort Les chevaliers Cathares Y pensent encore N'en déplaise à ceux qui décident Du passé et du présent Ils n'ont que sept siècles d'histoire Ils sont toujours vivants J'entends toujours le bruit des armes Et je vois encore souvent Des flammes qui lèchent des murs Et des charniers géants Les chevaliers Cathares Pleurent doucement Au bord de l'autoroute Quand le soir descend Comme une dernière insulte Comme un dernier tourment Au milieu du tumulte En robe de ciment |
The Cathar knights Cry softly Next to the highway When night falls Like one last insult Like one last torment Amidst the tumult In robes of concrete The smog of the cars The pebbles from children Their eyes on the torture fields And the trashcans in front It must be someone from above the Loire Who designed the plans He forgot on the robes The stains of blood They were sculpted in the stone That broke their bodies Their faces in the dust Of their ancient treasure On the big panel of light Tell of their death too The Cathar knights Still think of it With all due respect to those who decide Of the past and the present They only have seven centuries of history They are still alive I still hear the clash of weapons And I still often see Flames that lick the walls And giant mass graves The Cathar knights Cry softly Next to the highway When night falls Like one last insult Like one last torment Amidst the tumult In robes of concrete |
NB:
N'en déplaise à: “no offense to,” “with all due respect to,” “like it or not.”
N'en déplaise à: “no offense to,” “with all due respect to,” “like it or not.”
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