Caussou

tableau comm|nomcommune=Caussou
région=Midi-Pyrénées|département=Ariège|arrondissement=Foix|canton=Les Cabannes|insee=09087|cp=09250|maire=Maurice Calmein|mandat=2001-2008|intercomm=Communauté de communes des vallées d'Ax|longitude=1.80638888889|latitude=42.7697222222|alt moy=840 m|alt mini=760 m|alt maxi=1920 m|hectares=1583|km²=15,83|sans=84|date-sans=1999|dens=5|

Caussou is a small village in the department of Ariège in the Midi-Pyrénées area of France; its inhabitants are called "Caussounais". Its Church is dedicated to St Jean Baptist.

Locality

The village is situated at an altitude of 2,970 and gives its name to the Val de Caussou - which a 6 mile long cut connecting the Ariège valley to the Col de Marmare; the village overlooks the confluence of two streams:
* Rusisseau de la Coume d'Amont - (known in the 13th century as the brook of Caussou) and
* Marmare

The Rusisseau de la Coume d'Amont bisects the village on a north/south basis, whilst the Marmare rises some three miles north east of the village from near the top of the Col de Marmare. Behind the Marmare are located the Cathar stronghold villages of Prades and Montaillou.

Cathar associations

This part of France is famous for its Cathar associations and the village gave birth to the famous Cathar Béatrice de Planisoles - the one-time châtelaine of Montaillou. Her family were minor nobility in the area.

In the 1200s and early 1300s, the route over the Col de Marmare was an important route for the Cathars and proided them with a lifeline. From Caussou to either Prades or Montaillou involves and arduous 7 mile journey - beginning with a gentle slope up and past the Marmare and then rises steeply for approximately 2 miles to the col itself.

From the early thirteenth century for the next 7 or 8 decades, Caussou was greatly affected by the Inquisitions and saw many of its inhabitants forced to wear the Yellow cross - the punishment sign of the heretics.

Béatrice's father was an ardent Cathar and frequently accommodated the Cathar Perfects in his Caussou house.

It was in 1322 in the Caussou garden of Béatrice's uncle Pons de Planisoles, that her cousin Raymond and an accomplice by the name of Bourret buried the body of a shepherd that he had murdered. The aristocratic Raymond was never charged with the murder, but the hapless Bourret was hanged for the offence at Foix. At his trial in an attempt to reek revenge, Bourret had implicated one of Béatrice's brothers Bernard as a Cathar heretic; as a result, on the 4th July 1322, Bernard, who still lived at Caussou, was sentenced to wear the Yellow cross by the Inquisition.

Population

*1806 - 417
*1851 - 467
*1856 - 415
*1901 - 282
*1921 - 251
*1946 - 176
*1968 - 145
*1982 - 95
*1999 - 84

External links

* [http://www.histariege.com/caussou.htm Caussou website]
* [http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caussou French Wikipedia]

References

*The Yellow Cross - the story of the last cathars 1290 - 1329. René Weis . Penguin Viking 2000. ISBN 0-14-027669-6