What is Mont Saint Michel?
“What a strange place is this Mont-Saint-Michel! All around us, as far as one can see, infinite space, the blue horizon of the sea, the green horizon of the earth, clouds, air, freedom, birds in full flight, ships with full sails; and then, all of a sudden, there, in the crack of an old wall, above our heads, through a barred window, the pale face of a prisoner.”
Victor Hugo 1836
After the French Revolution, it became a prison for women, children, and men hence the moniker “Bastille of the Sea”. 14,000 people were imprisoned there from 1793 to 1863.
A treadwheel crane was installed to help bring food to the prisoners.
Prisoners walked the wheel.
Ramp for the windlass. I’m sure you have never heard this word before. (I had not.)
It was an “impregnable fortress.” During the 100 Years War, the English failed to breach its walls on each and every attempt. It was the only place in Normandy that never fell to the English. Mont Saint Michel has also been a village for more than a thousand years.
Imagine living here in 1066 after the magnificent Romanesque Abbey had been built. Mont Saint Michel town and the religious order are very wealthy. All the nobles from far and wide come to curry favor with its inhabitants and are generous with their gifts. William, their own Duke of Normandy, is conquering England. Meanwhile, the relentless tide rushes in and out and some poor souls perish in its wake. And always the wind and the gulls, the very song of freedom itself, playing all around telling us of another world, other places left unexplored.
Sunrise on Mont Saint Michel
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