Tribute to ARIÉ ... ..JOIE to Cordes sur Ciel
Pillaged, burnt, sacked by the Crusaders, Cordes was desolated after the Albigensian War,
Raymond 7, Count of Toulouse then created a charter of privileges with faith,
For people who would come to settle on the "Puech de Mordagne"
The Cordes regained hope and held a fair for St Bartholomew in the open country.
In this country devastated by the hordes of Simon de Montfort, the barbarian,
The love of the native soil was allied to the defense of Albigism, the Cathar heresy,
As soon as the walls had crowned the Cordillian hill, many heretics sheltered there,
Protected on this peak that emerges from the mists, like on an island far from the velléitaires.
Once Catharism was tamed, the wise administration of King St. Louis pushed the prosperity of the city,
Many bourgeois enriched by commerce built beautiful houses with sandstone facades,
This golden age was born of the opulence of the artisanal and commercial activity of the locality,
But the Hundred Years War, its plunderers and the plague epidemic weakened the deserted village.
During the Wars of Religion, Cordes will not fall into the Reformation and its verses,
The Huguenots twice made themselves masters of it, committing the worst excesses,
But faithful to "the House of God", the bastide will organize its resistance
On the night of 22 May 1575, forcing the assailants to leave the village, avoiding the gallows.
But between 1629 and 1632, the population Cordaise will be ravaged by the plague,
Subsequently misery will severely experience the class of the modest people,
Until the Revolution the plague and scarcity afflicted the locality of the Cordeans,
Its industry is in decline, its trade is falling, and its economic influence is dying out.
Cordes sur Ciel, in spite of the centuries, knew how to cross the Revanchist History,
Its superb set of Gothic houses remains intact and enthralls tourists,
Prosper Mérimée in the 19th century, according to their past, gave names to these houses,
"Maisons du Grand Écuyer, Grand Veneur, Grand Fauconnier", classified heritage with reason.
While the village springs from its peak in a sea of clouds, Cordes is resplendent,
The city with a hundred ogives kept, its gates, its walls, its alleys and its old houses,
But Cordes lost its tranquility, invaded by innumerable visitors in any season,
From the gate of the Levant to the gate of the conqueror, the village became the Temple of the Merchants.
L’ARIÉ….JOIE