Montmajour, or Montmajor as it is often spelt, stands upon a rocky elevation rising out of the extensive flat plain of La Crau. Its situation is unique, and was selected away back in the time when the lands surrounding it were covered with water, and the only means of access was by boats or rafts. Although the antiquity of the site of the monastery built upon this erstwhile island is undoubted, the exact date of the Church and Chapel which constitute the older parts of the group of buildings there to-day, have been the subject of much debate and controversy.

For years, nay for centuries, the famous Chapel of the “Holy Cross” was regarded as a building of the eighth century, the exact date of its construction being A.D. 779. The authority given was a Latin inscription now almost illegible, setting forth how the church was built and dedicated by Charlemagne to commemorate his great victory over the Saracens, and further recording that the rebuilding by him of the Abbey of Montmajour was another token of gratitude. Another inscription (more legible) reads, “Many of the Franks who perished in the combat repose in the chapel of the Monastery.... Brothers, pray for them.” The inscription refers, of course, to the Saracenic invasions of Provence A.D. 732 and 797, the earlier one repulsed by Charles Martel, and the latter by his grandson Charlemagne. This inscription has, however, to be ignored and regarded as the work of zealous monks at a much later date, anxious to add to the lustre of their monastery, and not too scrupulous in accepting traditions which gave this chapel a celebrity and antiquity wholly undeserved.

It was early in the last century that the pretensions of the inscription received their death-blow by the discovery of a hitherto unnoticed dedication on the pediment of the porch. The reliability of this find seemed to be confirmed by an ancient charter which attributed the erection of the building to the AbbÉ Rambert, and its consecration too, some three years later. This date obtained right up to the end of the last century, when expert opinion demonstrated, by external and internal evidences, that although standing on the site of a much older chapel, the present one was not erected until late in the twelfth or early in the thirteenth century.

This little chapel stands about three hundred yards away from the main buildings of the Abbey. The hard rock all around it is carved out into long shallow graves, which, with the exception of one, on the sloping ground near to the larger church of the Abbey, have been opened—that is to say, the heavy slabs of stone that formerly covered them have been removed and the bodies have disappeared. This pillage and desecration of the last resting-places of the brothers of the Monastery was the work of the revolutionary mobs from Arles, who, not content with rich plunder obtained in the Monastery itself, sought for any jewels buried with the dead.

The Chapel of the “Holy Cross” was the mortuary chapel to this cemetery in the rocks, and the sacredness of the spot made such wide appeals to the religious superstitions of the age that many distinguished knights and nobles sought the honour of resting their bones in the enduring tombs cut in the hallowed rocks of Montmajour. The chapel is built in the shape of a cross with equal arms, the ends apsidal, buttressed, and half-vaulted. The square central tower is surmounted by a tiny cupola immediately above a small bell-lantern tower. The chapel has but three small windows, intended more to allow the light that was always kept burning inside the chapel to shed its rays upon the graveyard outside than to light the interior.

There are differences of opinion as to the original object of the chapel, but it seems more than probable that the lantern in the roof was designed to contain the beacon which it was the custom in the Middle Ages to keep burning at night in memory of the dead.

There is no sculptured ornament in the interior of the chapel. The walls are severely plain, but they doubtless were at one time covered with Byzantine frescoes, in harmony with the general architectural style of this building which stands in isolated dignity upon the rock above the meres.

The Abbey of Montmajour, now in a ruined state, was in the Middle Ages a “Benedictine” establishment of great importance and influence, with a reputation for sanctity that drew thousands of pilgrims annually from all parts of the world, across the shallow lagoons in boats and on rafts, the only means of reaching it, until well on into the seventeenth century. The work of draining La Crau began in the sixteenth century, and gradually converted the swamp into a fertile plain; but even as late as the eighteenth century the faithful had to make a part of their pilgrimage by boat. The Abbey retained its great reputation, and increased its power during the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, and the lofty modern buildings of the seventeenth century testify to the wealth and ambition of the Order at that time. It, however, suffered a gradual decline after the issue of an order of Louis XVI., confirmed by Rome, suppressing its powers. This was only about three years before the outbreak of the Revolution, which ended for ever the long monastic career of Montmajour.

The approach to the Abbey, across rich low-lying meadows, dotted with feathery trees, is romantic and full of charm, and the ancient buildings stand out like a feudal castle, in strong relief against the sky or distant hills, according to the direction from which it is approached. A castle strongly fortified, for the machicolated tower built in the fourteenth century rises from the most elevated portion of the rock to a height of nearly ninety feet.

The older parts of the chapel or church, like the buildings at Les Baux, are for the most part cut out of the solid rock. The earliest part of the building is hewn in this manner, and in the lowest recesses of the subterranean church there is a small cell about four and a half feet by two feet, carved crudely out of the rocks, and containing a massive stone seat. A small square hole cut in the wall serves to let a stream of light into this tiny cell, which is known as the Confessional of St. Trophimus, the apostle of Provence. This cell is at the end of a series of narrow caves, one of which constitutes the sanctuary, the other contains two tombs excavated in the rock near its face. The small arched windows in the masonry which forms one side of these underground chapels admit the bright light of day, and from them the occupants of the little sanctuary or vestibule could obtain a magnificent view of the distant countryside. As the vestibule was used by the brothers when waiting their turn at the Confessional, these windows would serve to relieve the monotony of many a tedious hour.

The crypt of the Church of the Monastery is sepulchral and gloomy. Instead of a staircase a long passage descends with a gentle slope from the west end of the church above, and leads to the underground chapel, the reason assigned to this method of entrance being that it allowed of elaborate processions passing from the ancient to the modern building with effective decorum. At the end of this long passage there is a spherically vaulted gallery with seven smaller chapels radiating from it. A massive altar of great antiquity stands in the middle of the centre chapel. Entirely free from all rich decoration, the whole place reeks of the dark ages, a fitting symbol of a period when art was struggling towards a new expression.

The crypt was probably built in the ninth or tenth century, and rebuilt by the AbbÉ Rambart towards the end of the eleventh. The church above was started by the same abbot, but was never finished according to the original plan, for the west front is a hurried piece of construction evidently intended to serve until some future date when the Abbey banking account should be in a sufficiently flourishing state to give an imposing finish to the building.

The tower of the Monastery, which gives it the appearance of a fortress, was built in the middle of the fourteenth century, and possesses all the characteristics of the most advanced military architecture of the period. Its walls are built of smaller blocks of stone than is usual in similar buildings of that time. The great hall on the ground floor was used by the inhabitants of the Monastery as a storehouse, containing also a cistern into which the water was collected from the roofs, the overflow finding its way into exterior reservoirs.

The most modern part of the Monastery is to-day in the hands of private owners, but in such a dilapidated condition that it is almost unsafe to venture among its tottering walls. These buildings, erected during a period of the institution’s greatest prosperity, suffered more at the Revolution than the older parts of the Abbey. If the florid eighteenth-century buildings were all removed, they would be little loss to the place from an architectural point of view, for their features strike a discordant note among the simple early Gothic surroundings.

The cloisters of Montmajour are not very unlike those of St. Trophimus at Arles, and if the pillars and capitals of the arcade are less interesting in detail than those of the more famous cloisters, they have a more pleasing and less confusing effect in the mass. Round the walls there are several very beautiful tombs with a variety of early styles of arched canopies—pointed, round, and inflected.

Amongst these is the tomb of Geoffrey VI., a Count of Provence, who died in 1063. He was a generous patron and friend to the Monastery, and in the eleventh century conceded, along with other rights, the privilege of claiming the first sturgeon which should be caught in the river between Mourrade de Bourques and the sea. This typically feudal privilege was, until the Revolution, enforced more by way of custom latterly, and a great procession of holiday-making fishermen, with bands playing and banners flying, accompanied by innumerable sightseers, came on rafts and in boats to the Abbey with their offering. Masses were celebrated for the soul of the good Count, a handsome pourboire given to the fishermen, the sturgeon cooked and placed upon the already groaning

board of the epicurean brothers, and everybody was contented and happy.

The Benedictine Monastery of Montmajour enjoyed so many other privileges and bequests that it grew to be one of the richest and most powerful in the whole of France. No wonder the laity were keen to swell its holy ranks and enjoy its privileged security and bountiful board, its immunity from taxation and public service. The amazing contrast to the luxury of the Abbey’s latter days is the legend of the poverty and homelessness of those for whom it was founded.

The story runs, or, as the troubadours say, it is told and said and related, that when Villegis, King of the Goths, who had already dispossessed the Romans of Arles of their last colony in Gaul, surrendered to the Frankish conqueror Childebert, the latter, hunting one day over his newly-acquired territory in the vicinity of Arles, met with some hermits on a lonely mountain-side whose piety and poverty so touched the victorious barbaric King that he founded for them the Monastery of Montmajour.