Slate roofs and volcanic stone
Nov. 12th, 2007 08:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustAu toit de Lauzes (warning: site generates pop-ups) is a big house on the edge of the old town of Murat. We arrived on foot from the tourist office, an uphill sprint, because the staff there declined to give us directions for driving in - or around - the old town. Ute, whose house it is, welcomed us into her huge kitchen and offered us tea. She had builders in, and the walls were hidden by white sheets; in theory she had closed for the season, but had received a distress call from two young Germans who were walking the GR (one of the pilgrim routes to Compostella), and once she had given them a room, might as well let us stay too.
Outside, like most of the old town, the house is dark grey stone, roofed with lauzes, slabs of local slate; inside the builders had spread dust over the kitchen and stairs, but our room was bright and fresh, painted in sunshine yellow and blue, hung with Ute's vivid paintings. "We have a chandelier" say my notes, but I can't remember what it looked like; and we had our own front door with geraniums on the step, through which we went out in search of dinner.
In the morning we breakfasted in a large square room: one wall was ordinary plaster, one was stripped back to show the rough stone and mortar of which it was built, and the other two were wood-panelled, one with tow large cupboards, the other with three tall windows occupying most of the wall. When I admired it, Ute told me that we were here in the older part of the house, which was thirteenth century, and that the stone wall was part of the city wall. The original house had been one long range of rooms along the city wall. Part of the house was intra muros, part extra muros; it had belonged to the Templars, and with the dissolution of that order had passed to the Hospitallers - and even the "newer" part of the house was shown in a deed of 1570.
In the morning, we explored the town, following the route in the tourist office's leaflet. No cathedral, no castle, no major historical events, just a large number of attractive buildings, interesting alleyways, unexpected details. I particularly liked:
Outside, like most of the old town, the house is dark grey stone, roofed with lauzes, slabs of local slate; inside the builders had spread dust over the kitchen and stairs, but our room was bright and fresh, painted in sunshine yellow and blue, hung with Ute's vivid paintings. "We have a chandelier" say my notes, but I can't remember what it looked like; and we had our own front door with geraniums on the step, through which we went out in search of dinner.
In the morning we breakfasted in a large square room: one wall was ordinary plaster, one was stripped back to show the rough stone and mortar of which it was built, and the other two were wood-panelled, one with tow large cupboards, the other with three tall windows occupying most of the wall. When I admired it, Ute told me that we were here in the older part of the house, which was thirteenth century, and that the stone wall was part of the city wall. The original house had been one long range of rooms along the city wall. Part of the house was intra muros, part extra muros; it had belonged to the Templars, and with the dissolution of that order had passed to the Hospitallers - and even the "newer" part of the house was shown in a deed of 1570.
In the morning, we explored the town, following the route in the tourist office's leaflet. No cathedral, no castle, no major historical events, just a large number of attractive buildings, interesting alleyways, unexpected details. I particularly liked:
- the information that in the seventeenth century the goldsmiths of Murat were unequalled in the art of cutting amethysts (such a very specific skill!).
- M. Gaudron's clock: the figures are said to represent his children, dressed in traditional Auvergnat costume. We weren't there at midday, unfortunately, so we didn't see them danse the bourrée, or hear the cock crow twelve times.
- a shop specialising in local delicacies, where I stocked up on chestnut flour, chestnut cake and a jar of lentil jam (how could I not try lentil jam? But the lentils contribute more to the texture than to the taste, which is mainly of sweetness and cinnamon).
