At all times man has felt attracted by the beauties of nature. The Cirque de Mourèze represents not only a fantastic nature monument, but a real town with a citadel created by nature (Courtinals), with narrow as well as dead end streets,with cellars, stables, steeples, columns, arches, monuments, fortifications and a system of mazes. Overviewing the Cirque from the Belvédère you can realize best the total dimensions of this amphitheatre which visitors from all over the world are admiring every day. It is likely to think of the sea of rocks as being the remains of an antique town, a chaotic formation of rocks which seems to transmit a message via symbols and signs.

The Cirque has always been provided with a mild climate, even during the Ice Ages. It offers a perfect hiding place, a fortification for defence with ideally posted guardians as well as to safely keep cattle within natural fences. The never drying up spring in Mourèze, the “Fountain of the Angel” has provided clear mineral water for millenniums. The little creek „Petite Dourbie“ 50 meters off the rocks of the Parc des Courtinals was an ideal spot for watering the cattle and for washing the laundry. The surrounding woods housed game and grew blackberries, figs, strawberries and a long list of medical herbs. A mere paradise for men in early ages !

The human settlements in the valleys since the Paleolithicum have never been proven true neither through constructions nor by other indicators. But taking in consideration the colonizations of other locations in the area, it turns out to be more than obvious that the Cirque had been inhabited for at least 50.000 yrs. The first traces originate from the Mid Neolithicum, i.e. about 7.000 yrs BC.
Apparently – and future archaeological research will prove this to be true – the most intense period of colonizing the Cirque was between the end of Neolithicum ( 3.000 BC) and the Iron Age (600 to 300 BC).

In 1911 the archaeologist G. VASSEUR from Marseille had found in the course of the first excavations an especially beautiful artefact just underneath the Belvédère next to the pick nick area: A small goose formed in clay originating from the Baltic Sea area brought to the Cirque approx. 3.000 BC. This demonstrates the for reaching trade relations in between certain regions in Europe during the Neolithicum.

During 5 years of regular excavations neither tombs, graves or traces of fights had been found. The tribes used to live there in peace, protected by the steep walls of the rocks und , why not, by the mysterious force of this location? Which other explanation men in the Stone Age could have had for this mystic and sometimes also frightening chaos of rocks? A town of Cyclops, an enchanted landscape, the entrance to hell, a window to another world ? Still today we have to admit that this landscape is most impressive; especially under a bright full moon and that even to us who we are spoilt by the magics of television !

The Cirque has always attracted men, but esp. original characters. Such a display of nature has a strong Ying and Yang effect, a balance between good and bad. The scribe Gaston COMBARNOUS has invested his entire fortune in researching the Cirque. He tried to prove in his books that only very few rock formations had been created by nature and that the erection of individual rock pillars did not happen by coincidence. In his books COMBARNOUS writes about the Cirque of Mourèze as an immense collective memorial to the population of the Stone Age, who had been colonizing this location for millenniums und who have tried to provide us with a message out of their recent world. Is it really an coincidence, that „post funera vivet” is the medieval motto of the village, which means : “here exists a life after death.”?

In short, Monsieur COMBARNOUS regarded the Cirque as a “Disneyland” of ancient ages or as an enormous temple with symbols, which still need to be translated. The huge Skull above the Cirque, orientated towards the South, visible from everywhere and safeguarding this huge “playground”, the Sphinx and the Mistress, incorporating life and sexuality, the perfectly shaped Sleeping Lion, the Bear und the Shepherd representing the animals’ world. The Obese Women, the Pregnant Women, the Phalluses and the triangular Altars also underline the hypotheses of COMBARNOUS. Phantasmagoria, the special positionings of different figures, balconies and mazes are mysterious for those who are interested in the Alchemy of Mourèze.

During the excavations in 1991 Dr Gérard TURBANISCH discovered on several spots of the high rock walls deep notches. These counterforts prove without any doubt the existence of considerably large fortifications throughout and around the park. The traces of curtain walls ( French: courtines), of palisades und of at least one bridge. They were rebuilt according to their traces found in the rocks. But is ii not possible to date those mechanical traces in the rocks, as the erosion of the Dolomite has already been too far reaching.

Some walls in the Cirque loose up to 10 millimeters of material per century, that concludes a loss of about 50 cm along the walls since the end of the Neolithicum. The carbonic acid, naturally contained in rain water, the wind, the storms, frost and a multitude of tourists having climbed the rocks make the fragile stones erode on a fast pace. This fact explains also the absence of rock paintings and engravings in the rocks.
Nevertheless a Cross of the Catharers, which is engraved into one of the walls of the steeples of Courtinals the presence of that perfect Religious Order during their crusades between their eastmost castle, St.Michel and St-Guilhelm le Désert. Since the Middle Ages the huge wall across from the village of Mourèze has been called „Hôpital”, not in the sense of hospital, but according to the language use of the Middle Ages “Inn” or “Rest Area”. Furthermore we need to mention the Hermitage of St.Jean on the mountain of Liausson named after the Hospitaliers of St.Jean, a religious order who had been the successors of the Templars.

A letter from Marshall Henry de Montmercy written on July 16th 1587 to the Governor of Lodève states the importance of the garrison of Mourèze und the necessity to remunerate the soldiers stationed there for the protection of this strategically important place. Even taken in consideration that during the Roman occupation the Roman Road Nîmes–Toulouse led through Mourèze, just underneath Courtinals, and therefore a protecting garrison was stationed in Mourèze, it is hard to understand why a museum of rocks was to be protected in a special way during the Religious Wars.

A twenty- meter tunnel, cut into the rock of the mountain, several caves, stairs of stones and several enchanted spots in the world of rocks, there are numerous such places that wait for excavation and exploration! According to Prof. GARCIA about 10% of the Cirques potential have been excavated in the last century. Even the location of Courtinals is considered as one of the “most important archeological sites in the middle Hérault valley “ (CNRS), some further aspects shall not be neglected as there are the signs carved into the rocks, the counterforts in the walls, the completion of the steeples and the strange and sudden desertion of the gallic village around 350 BC.

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