Menu enigmas & hypotheses of RLC

The presbytery

Bérenger Saunière, as we know it, spent a fortune for the construction of the set of his domain.
The Béthanie villa was the place of ostentatious receipts where surrendered of numerous personalities of the abbot's time.
Bérenger Saunière received them with lots of pomp and luxury that didn't fail to leave unforgettable memories to his/her/its visitors.

However, there is a point that it is necessary to recall: Bérenger Saunière never got settled in the Béthanie villa. It was not, for him, that a place of receipt and welcome. Of the luxury of the Béthanie villa, Bérenger Saunière and Marie Dénarnaud, will prefer the austerity of the presbytery. Because we can speak of austerity. Rustic building, rustic pieces, Bérenger Saunière will never live elsewhere.

The presbytery was shared between the priest, his maid and its maid's family. Bérenger Saunière had a small piece in the first floor that served him of room. The family Dénarnaud was installed on the same floor that the abbot. As for Marie Dénarnaud, she had a room at the second floor of beautiful measurements.

It is necessary to ask the following question: Why Bérenger Saunière, man of taste and pomp, didn't he ever get settled in the Béthanie villa?

Several answers can be proposed :

1 as priest he wanted to remain in the picture of the Christ's poverty!
2 he didn't wish to move away especially of the presbytery!

The first answer can satisfy those that have the conviction that Bérenger Saunière didn't make anything particular in his life, and that only the traffic of Mass of which it was accused is at the origin of its fortune.

In what concerns us us have a lot of difficulty to abound in this sense and we opt, well on, toward the second hypothesis. 
Bérenger Saunière didn't wish to move away of his/her/its presbytery!

We know that has his arrival in Rennes-Le-Chateau, the young priest found the presbytery in such a state that he cannot get of it settled. It is by dint of works that he can make he habitable. 

Some witnesses of the time told that he/it arrived to see Bérenger Saunière going back to the presbytery and to see it later some moments to leave the church by the door again, without whoever saw it to leave the presbytery! Myth or reality? 

These testimonies are disturbing and would attest the hypothesis that Bérenger Saunière could have discovered a means to penetrate in the church in a discreet way.

Several facts can make us think that these hypotheses would be real. In their book "The inheritance of abbot Saunière ", Mr. and Mrs. Captier underline that Bérenger Saunière and Marie Dénarnaud had established a reciprocal bequest will while stipulating with precision that no inventory had to be made of their goods and the presbytery. What did they wish to hide to the eyes of all? This simple phrases demonstrates us that the priest and his maid concealed important elements and also, that Marie was perfectly aware of the secret and his content.

From this element we can admit that the presbytery of the village plays an a lot more important role than what the present analyses seem to forget.

First of all, it is useful to think about the structure of the Rennes-Le-Chateau church. The first time where we went to the village a detail astonished us quickly: Why does one go in the church by quoted it? The more part of the churches, that they are Romanesque or Gothic, have an access by the facade of the building. In the primitive Romanesque churches, what seems to be the dating of the Rennes-Le-Chateau church, the entry made itself solely by the facade. 

To the support of this reasoning we can wonder therefore about this lateral entry of the present church of Rennes-Le-Chateau.

The plan of mass of the whole domain, including the church of the village gives us an answer. As we can note it, the presbytery is in the extension of the present church. Since the last works of renovation of the church we can see the point of "raccrochement" of the presbytery to the whole building. 

The church of Rennes-Le-Chateau has sudden several evolutions during the times. Alain Feral explains it to us in his book" kingdom of the deaths": it is in the XVIIéme century that the main porch of the church was obstructed in the objective to build the presbytery that we know currently. 

Instead the porch was constructed a tribune, allowing the notables to follow the Mass without having to mingle with the people of the time. It is precisely instead this tribune that Bérenger Saunière made the fresco of the church that we can see currently above the confessional install.

But come back to the presbytery. Constructs in the XVIIème century it is in the exact extension of the church. When Bérenger Saunière and Marie Dénarnaud lived there, it is the living room that was common with the church. Besides, a short noise to Rennes-Le-Chateau that says that when the works of planning of the presbytery for the creation of the museum were done, It was put up to date the eardrum of the Saint-Marie-Madeleine church. To the view of this eardrum, it was asked to cover it and not to speak any! A pity, this eardrum would have been surely very beautiful in this piece of the museum! It is necessary to believe that it had to not have any historic importance in spite of his/her/its old age! Anyway it is only a noise that spreads.

Then, just to quoted of the living room, was the storeroom, that he was also common with the church. On the other hand it presents an interesting particularity, the lateral wall of the storeroom, and therefore of the presbytery, is slightly below the level of soil. It doesn't have anything of very exceptional safe, if this soil is the one of the cemetery. Can one think that it is in this zone that Bérenger Saunière would have found an access driving it toward the church? And maybe toward elsewhere? Because recall ourselves, it is certain that people saw Bérenger Saunière leaving the church without having entered there. by the door!

The question that we can put ourselves in this year 2002, is to wonder if it is so useful to make some excavations in the church that was searched many time and returned? Is it so useful to search under the Magdala tower who it has also been searched several times by the set of its former owners and well of others?

Why didn't one judge useful to clear the eardrum primitive of the church? And has not it been found "something" then in the presbytery at the time of its renovation?

To all official excavators (archaeologists, historians.) we ask the following question: "Why don't you search in the soil of the presbytery? Just in this building that Bérenger Saunière and Marie Dénarnaud didn't want to leave especially! In more this monument is not classified and it belongs at the township, it is not therefore useful to make demands of excavations to the DRAC! ", it is only just a question! And it only supported itself on a noise that spreads.!