CHAPTER XII
Saint-Remy
On the way up from Les Baux to the col, and for some distance beyond, the country is arid and cold; but the wealth of aromatic and flowering shrubs that carpet the ground in these stony regions, and the breathing spirit of the spring, gives them a charm of their own that is far removed from desolation. The road was lonely enough. A few flocks of sheep and goats clattered among the loose stones of the hillsides that were on either side, among the pines and the thyme and rosemary and the yellow brooms; and the shepherds watched and whistled to them, never very far away. A motor-car passed me as I rested at the top of the hill, and a carriage jogging along the straight road to the "plateau des antiquités" offered itself for a lift; for I was on my way to see something that every tourist in these parts comes to see, and this one was plying for hire in this lonely region in the ordinary way of business. But otherwise I had the road to myself in the early morning, and took my time over the six or seven kilometres that were all that I was yet able to accomplish.
The two noble monuments that stand in an open space a mile or so to the south of Saint-Remy, and dominate the wide expanse on all sides, can be seen long before one reaches them, from the south. The wildness of the hills has begun to give place to cultivation, but they stand by themselves with no other buildings near them, reminders of a story that has never been forgotten by the poorest and least educated of those who work within sight of them.
The so-called mausoleum is the older of the two. It has an inscription that has caused considerable difficulties to the antiquarians. I need not go into the controversy, but will accept the conclusions set forth by Mr. Cook, who deals with the question in his own lucid and convincing way.
The inscription is to the effect that Sextus, Lucius, and Marcus, Julii, and sons of Caius, dedicated this monument to their parents; and within the colonnade on the top of it are two statues which have been supposed to represent these objects of filial piety. But the inscription is not less than a hundred years later than the date of the monument on which it was carved, and the probability is that some rich colonials "calmly appropriated a fine 'antiquity,' wrote their own names on it, and buried the respected corpses of their parents within a building originally intended for entirely different uses."
The bas-reliefs on the four sides of the base represent a Roman triumph, and there seems little doubt that this noble monument was erected to commemorate the great victory of Caius Marius over the barbarians, on the spot where he had first met them. It was erected by Julius Cæsar, the nephew of Marius, and the two figures represent the great general himself, and Catullus, his colleague in the consulship, when their combined forces crushed the Cimbrians upon the Raudine Plain.
The Triumphal Arch, which stands close to the monument, was also erected by Julius Cæsar, to celebrate his great victory over Vercingetorix. It is the earliest Roman triumphal arch outside Italy, and there are probably only two in Rome that are earlier.