A pleasant 45-minute bus ride this morning and we arrived at the small town of Saint Remy de Provence, famous for a number of reasons. Off we set on the one kilometre Van Gogh Walk, a gentle uphill meander past many reproduction Van Gogh paintings before arriving at the Monastery of Saint Paul de Mausole, built in the 11th century. Franciscan monks turned it into an “asylum for the mentally ill” in 1605 and it is still a fully functioning psychiatric hospital treating up to 150 short-term patients at any one time. It has functioned continuously, in one form or another, in its thousand years of life. (Albert Schweitzer was interned here for a time during World War II when it was under control of the Germans). It has been private asylum – psychiatric facility – since 1855, devoted to treating the mentally ill and the inmates have access to art workshops as part of their therapy.
Apart from
the clinical and residential quarters the original complex contains a beautiful
chapel and cloisters.
Vincent Van
Gogh was an inpatient here, at his own request, from May 1989 until May 1890
and produced some of his most famous works here – 100 drawings and 150
paintings, including Starry Night, The Irises, The Wheatfield and The
Harvester. We were able to visit the
sparse room that Van Gogh occupied and look out of the window across the
gardens, fields and mountains, knowing that what we were seeing was exactly
what Van Gogh would have seen, a view that inspired some of his most treasured paintings,
as he looked out through the bars more than 130 years ago. A very moving morning.
A short
walk took us to the Mausoleum of Glanum, erected in 30-20BC and believed to
have been erected in memory of a member of the Julii family, a soldier, for his
contribution to the conquest of Gaul. It
is in remarkable condition. Immediately adjacent is the Arc de triomphe de
Glanum, built in 20 CE. Although
incomplete, it is very similar to the arch we saw in Orange yesterday and
signified the entrance to Glanum, inhabited from the 7th century
BCE, with Hellenic (Greek) and Roman influences. It was largely destroyed by the Barbarians
invasions of 260CE however there are still significant remains extant. We spent quite some time at this
archaeological site, which is very well sign posted (a visual recreation is
also available at the entrance to the site).
We wandered
along the old main street, through the remains of the houses, temples, the
forum, thermal baths, sacred springs, imagining life in this busy place. At one point there were 1,768 steps (or so it
seemed) up to a viewing platform and John, fool that he is, climbed those steps
to get a panoramic view of this ancient site.
By then we
were starving, so we walked the kilometre back into town for lunch, then
explored the historic centre of Saint Remy de Provence, visiting the beautiful Collegiale
de Saint Martin de Saint Remy, with its huge organ, and coming across (quite
predictably) the birthplace in 1503 of Nostradamus.
Back on the
bus to Avignon after another day where we have been overwhelmed with the
Greco-Roman history of this region.
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