Next to be invested, Carcassonne, a populous city glorying in wickedness. On the feast of Saint Peter the living host arrived and quickly succeeded in crossing the entrenchment. Suburbs were taken, much of Carcassonne subdued after a week. However the abbot wearied of obstinate resistance and proposed to negotiate with Viscount Raymond Roger, offering safe conduct sanctioned by his oath and that of the barons. Therefore the viscount with three hundred men came to the abbot’s tent. But why should faith be kept with the faithless? The abbot dressed them all in chains. Three months the viscount lodged in prison before expiring. It may be that God received his soul. As for the inhabitants, when Carcassonne was subjugated a number contrived to escape. Many more embraced the stake or mounted the scaffold on account of their infidelity since the inquisitors proved rigorous. So much has been reported. Others say that in accordance with terms of capitulation every citizen departed, including sectaries, but all had left their property as spoil and Carcassonne was plundered in orderly fashion.
Lord Simon de Montfort, trustworthy and zealous, was chosen viscount of Béziers and Carcassonne. Tall, having a thick bush of hair and strong as any ox, albeit an old man near fifty. Heretics he loathed and considered his elevation to viscount a thread in the tapestry of God. Think you I am afraid? he replied to a Cistercian who would encourage him. My work is Christ’s work. We cannot be defeated.
Yet the air stank of rebellion. These Provenceaux grew less submissive. And the army dwindled because many in the host had little appetite for such a crusade. Faithless as southern Franks might be, they had no link to Saracens, Frankish blood ran through their veins. The count of Nevers made up his mind to go home. The duke of Burgundy followed. Thus it came about that Simon de Montfort commanded a fistful of knights and mercenaries. Winter and early spring went well enough. Albi surrendered. Limoux surrendered. Lesser towns opened their gates when he approached. Still, the passing of time caused those who had been terrified to question themselves. What are we? they said to one another. They began, cautiously, to strike. A soldier would be ambushed and killed, another seized. Now the count of Foix, observing how matters stood, took back one of his castles.
Simon addressed a plaintive appeal to His Holiness Innocent. I am left almost alone. Enemies of Christ occupy the mountains and hills. The land is impoverished. Heretics destroy or give up weak castles while strengthening others they expect to defend. I have been obliged to double the wages of my soldiers lest they depart. Without help I cannot govern much longer.
To what degree His Holiness responded is not known. But the wife of Simon de Montfort, Alice, brought a few hundred soldiers from Île-de-France. They were not many, but enough. He took the castle of Bram, sliced away the upper lip and nose of every defender and scooped out their eyes, all save one, granting this recreant a single eye that he might lead his mutilated comrades to the defiant fortress of Cabaret. It is related how some time afterward Bishop Folquet during a sermon compared heretics to wolves, the faithful to sheep, but was interrupted by one who displayed his wounds and asked if ever a wolf was so abused by a sheep. The Holy Church keeps dogs to guard its flock, Bishop Folquet replied. A loyal dog has bitten you. In this response we hear the guiding voice of our Lord, a mighty fortress against which advocates of Satan dash themselves in vain.
After a siege lasting seven weeks the garrison at Minerve chose to negotiate. Three Cathar women who thought themselves perfect now abjured a perfidious faith to save their skin. Others clinging stubbornly to the devil’s bosom were burnt, a number that exceeded one hundred and forty. Some hopped eagerly into the flame.
Termes resisted nine months but opened to Simon de Montfort on the twenty-third of November in that year of our Lord 1210.
Many succumbed, felt the whip. Alayrac. Pennautier. Coustaussa. Gaillac. Montaigu. La Grave. Still, a rank odor emanated from Languedoc.
Viscount Simon marched against Lavour. After two months of battering, the walls crumbled. Simon hanged Aimery de Montréal, who was commandant, with eighty of his knights. Yet by God’s design the gibbet broke, hence many that had expected a rope got their throats slit. Four hundred Cathari were rounded up, men and women both, and marched into a meadow where all burned rejoicing, such was their obduracy. Lady Guiraude de Laurac, chatelaine of Lavaur, after being dragged outside the gate was thrown into a well, stones dropped on top to bury her. A very great loss and sin, according to a chanson of those days, for never did a living soul depart hungry from the castle. However that may be, all were anathema to God and so this was not homicide but malicide. Truly did blessed Saint Augustine remark that precepts of forbearance should be kept by a wary heart.
Viscount Simon crossed the Rhône thinking to chastise other sectarians, unwisely marching away from the center of his strength. He attacked the proud city of Toulouse. Several times he was repulsed and the legate began to grumble. Why did he not subjugate this nest of vipers? Had he engaged in some evil that brought about God’s wrath?
During the ninth month a powerful chatte was built that could be rolled close to the ramparts and look across the city. But the men of Toulouse made a dawn sortie. Simon was hearing mass when he learned they had breached his camp. After concluding devotions he hurried to the battle, but just then Guy de Montfort was struck by an arrow. Simon rushed toward him, lamenting bitterly, and was hit by a stone in such wise that eyeballs, teeth, brains, and skull flew all to pieces and down he dropped stark dead and bloody. Now the city and the very
