The village of Rennes-le-Chateau, located in the very south of France, among the hills of Languedoc and about 40 kilometers from Carcassonne, is not much different from the neighboring villages. However, it contains the church of St. Mary Magdalene, built in the 7th-8th centuries on a foundation that generally dates back to the times of the Visigoths. The Rennes-le-Chateau mystery is precisely connected with this ancient church.
Until the middle of the 20th century, few people were interested in the French village of Rennes-le-Chateau and its old church. But after the release of several documentaries, and then the book "The Sacred Mystery" (aka "Holy Blood and the Holy Grail") interest aroused. Still - it was about unknown facts from the biography of Jesus Christ himself. And about the artifacts associated with his life. Historians, occultists and conspiracy theorists have entered into a fierce debate over the secrets of Rennes-le-Chateau.
Strange priest
The secrets of Rennes-le-Chateau began with the activity of the priest Beranger Saunière, who received a parish in the spring of 1885. The priest was young, handsome, and very ambitious. He was considered the best among the graduates of his seminary, but by a whim of fate he was sent to take care of the flock in the wilderness. The flock was few, the church was in such a state that Sauniere grabbed his head.
He had to live from hand to mouth, so to catching human souls the priest added fishing and hunting, so that he could depend on anyone. And in order not to howl with melancholy, he made friends with a priest from a neighboring parish and took up local history. Fortunately, on the nearby hill of Bezu, there were the ruins of the Templar command, on another hill - the ruins of the castle of one of the great masters of the templars Bertrand de Blanchefort, and through the village itself there was an ancient pilgrimage road to the Spanish city of Santiago de Compostela, where the relics of St. James were kept.
It is not known for certain what secrets were revealed to the priest during his studies of local history, but six years later he saved up some money, added donations from the parishioners to them, even took a kind of loan from them, and began to restore the church. With my own hand. In the course of work, Sauniere had to move the altar stone and two columns inside the temple. It was then that it turned out that one column is hollow inside and it contains a cache with four wooden boxes.
Inside the boxes were old documents, which the priest immediately took to his church authorities in Carcassonne. Three hidden documents contained genealogical trees of noble families. But the fourth, with extracts from the New Testament, turned out to be a kind of encryption.
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The Bishop of Carcassonne was so interested in the documents that he sent Sauniere to Paris, and he paid for his travel and accommodation. In the capital, the priest attends literary and philosophical circles, negotiates with scientists and clergy, walks to museums and even falls in love. And having returned back, with renewed vigor he searches for ancient stones, copies inscriptions from gravestones and completely transforms his church. Now, above the entrance to it, an inscription is engraved in Latin: TERRIBILIS EST LOCUS ISTE, which means … "This place is terrible." And in the "locus" itself there are strange pagan sculptures, the walls are painted with strange pictures.
At the same time, the priest has a lot of money, and there are rumors that he found the treasure. Sauniere himself is silent about the origin of his wealth. Suddenly, eminent persons begin to come to Rennes-le-Chateau, up to the Secretary of State for Culture and the cousin of the Austrian emperor. Rumors begin to circulate in the village that their priest has conspired with evil spirits. The church leadership, to which rumors reach, draws a different conclusion: Saunière sells sacred relics found during the restoration of the church. He was temporarily removed from service, but literally a month later he was reinstated. The strangeness continued until Saunière's death in January 1917. At the same time, the announcement of the will confuses everyone: the priest bequeaths the house to his servant, but there is no question of any money. The treasure, if there was one, disappeared without a trace …
Kaleidoscope of versions
There are several versions of what Saunière found during the renovation work. The first is based on the fact that the church itself stands on an even more ancient foundation. Of course, conspiracy theorists believe that the priest came across either the tomb of the Visigoth kings, or their treasures. Some even write about the Visigoth crown and list the diamonds, emeralds and rubies with which it is adorned. And then they calculate how much Sauniere sold the booty for.
The second version is related to the treasures of the Templars. Say, on the night before the arrests, the knightly treasures from the Parisian Temple were safely loaded onto carts and taken to Rennes-le-Chateau. The supporters of this version are also calculating with passion how much they can talk about.
According to the third version, during the restoration of the church, Saunière disturbed the cache of the Cathars. Since Rennes-le-Chateau is located exactly in the places where the Cathars lived, the adherents of the Albigensian heresy could well have hidden their relics. With only one caveat: the Cathars did not have worldly values. The fourth version is similar to the third. There was a cache in the church, but not Cathars, but, on the contrary, Catholics who hid expensive church utensils from the Albigensians. And Saunière realized this utensil.
The fifth version suggests that Saunière discovered the treasure of Queen Blanca of Castile, who was forced to flee from the rebellious people in the middle of the 13th century. Again - gold, diamonds, emeralds, rubies. And, of course, a rough estimate of the value of the treasure. This is based on the fact that on one of the genealogical trees found in the church, there was a queen's seal.
Another version is based on rumors of local residents. According to it, Sauniere found not diamonds and gold, but a recipe - how to get them from the prince of darkness. Proponents of this version cite the fact that Saunière did not leave a monetary inheritance as evidence. It is known, after all, that devil's money in Christian hands turns to dust and ash!
Finally, the seventh version unequivocally states that Sauniere found the Holy Grail. True, depending on what interpretation of the Grail those who share this opinion believe, the artifact becomes either a stone, then a cup, or even "lost descendants of Jesus." But in any case, for the Grail or for the secret of the Grail, Sauniere was entitled to a lifetime income from … the Vatican! In the first two cases - for a find, in the third - for silence.
Could Saunière find any values during his research? Of course he could. But I didn't find it. And even if he did, he would not have hidden it, just as he had not hidden old documents. There was no silver, no gold, no precious stones in the little church of Rennes-le-Château. But let's imagine that he found such a treasure. How to sell what you find? For an ordinary priest from the provinces, this would not be at all easy, and then it would not be Archduke Johann who would go to the village, but a buyer of stolen goods.
Secret documents
Saunière, suddenly becoming rich, not only rebuilt the Church of St. Magdalene. He erected the Magdalene Tower on one of the hills. Instead of a beggarly priest's house, he built a real mansion, Villa Bethany with a park, a pond and a greenhouse. He did not stint and equip the life of the parishioners. A good road appeared in Rennes-le-Chateau, he ran a water supply at his own expense, assigned maintenance to the poor, gave expensive gifts to everyone for the holidays. Some of the gifts were old, so there was a rumor in the village that Saunière, perhaps, had not contacted the devil, but had unearthed chests with Blanchefort's gold somewhere.
But much more interesting than the rumors about gold are the documents actually found by the priest, which he never denied. The first was dated 1243, the second - 1608, the third - 1695, the last - 1753. If we disregard the cipher's hints about the treasure that “belongs to King Dagobert and Zion” and which “is death”, then the secret discovered by Sauniere was more likely associated with the Blanchefort genealogy and concerned everyone who intermarried with them for 600 years.
Local residents caught the priest for reprehensible actions: he knocked down some inscriptions on gravestones. Was it not at the request of the descendants, who were not too eager to open the veil of family shame? Of course, stakeholders could make big gestures and fund Saunière's projects. But is it?
Saunière himself explained the unexpected wealth simply: he received an inheritance. He admitted that he was very interested in deciphering the mysterious manuscript, but he did not sell any found documents or compromising evidence against his contemporaries.
Magazine: Mysteries of History No. 38, Nikolay Kotomkin