Excluding recreation, the Excursion de France additionally supplies a possibility to (re)uncover our landscapes and every now and then their geological oddities. The course of the fourth degree, on July 7, between Carcassonne and Foix, takes the riders during the top of Bugarach, in Corbierre. A spot whose curious morphology has lengthy brought about a wide variety of myths and legends – in addition to a undeniable fresh fascination for fans of the New Age.
The title of this mountain comes from the Occitan Pueg – from which comes the phrase puech, which is every now and then used as an alternative of a top – and itself comes from the Latin podium, i.e. a prime position. The title Bugarach, however, comes from the Latin bulgarus (bulgres or buggers, this means that heretics). That is the title given, within the Heart Ages, to the ancestors of the Cathars.
This distinctive panorama has all the time stimulated the creativeness and impressed a large number of myths and legends. Some curious other people suppose that there they are going to to find hidden treasures, a meant alien base, even a UFO hangar, a galactic gate, a magnetic inversion website online, an front to Agartha, a meant mythical underground kingdom, or perhaps a sanctuary of the Ark of the Covenant…
Up to those ideals, which for essentially the most trendy are closely borrowed from the New Age, it’s instructive to look at the level to which this position, even these days, frees the creativeness.
Cape to offer protection to the obvious
Let’s get started with the oldest – and most renowned – of those legends, which pertains to Roman mythology.
She says that Aude was once as soon as a limiteless and fertile simple watched over by way of fairies and elves, comparable to Worm and Arach. Subjected to the whims of Ceres – the wind, son of Aeolus, the daddy of winds and storms – she nonetheless were given deficient harvests. The 2 elves then begged Jupiter to lend a hand them calm the excesses of Ceres. In reaction, the god would elevate this protecting promontory named after the elves, Bugarach, which restored prosperity to the plains of Roussillon and the Corbier Plateau.
Later, Qatari historical past would proceed to gasoline myths and imaginations across the top of Bugarač. There could be a treasure in it – that of Katara? Templars? Visigoths? Holy grail? Some rumors move as far as to consider that it’s the Ark of the Covenant, which accommodates the tables of the legislation.
New myths of the New Age, between the alien base and Noah’s Ark
Within the Sixties, mystics and hippies settled within the area, reviving myths and fueling new ones. Some in particular declare that an extraterrestrial base could be hidden in its many cavities, attached to a karst community advanced over ten million years within the mountain’s limestone.
The secret’s the realization that it will be a “high energy place” that will deliver in combination “all the ingredients that allow us to open up to other levels of consciousness” (sic). Some even declare to have noticed “time warps” or “space-time holes”.
Those ideals peaked in 2012, when a hoax, attributing the prediction to Nostradamus, introduced the tip of the sector for December 21, 2012. The alleged extraterrestrial base of the Bulgarians was once then observed by way of some as a haven, hoping that its meant occupants would possibly save a couple of “thanks to their chosen ones” in a brand new alternative. arch.
This sturdy rumor led Od Prefecture to prohibit get admission to to the summit and its underground galleries, in addition to flights over the mountain between December 19 and 23, 2012.
Stays of lines at the rocks of Bulgarach that evoke the tip of the sector (on the finish, 2012 can nonetheless be sensed). LucasD, CC BI-NC-ND
Within the evocations of the tip of the sector introduced for December 21, 2012, this website online must were spared as an “inverted mountain”. If truth be told, the mountain isn’t actually inverted: the higher layers are older than the decrease ones.
However you do not wish to invite extraterrestrial beings to grasp the explanations.
The formation of a extraordinary mountain
Somewhat geology is helping us perceive the start of this surprising summit. The Pyrenees have been created when the Iberian Peninsula, this is, Spain and Portugal, started to method France, about 50 million years in the past. The terrains that met and collided shaped a bulge, a aid.
Positive layers then shaped folds that lay down. More than one layers of plastic, comparable to salt and gypsum deposited within the Triassic (250 million years in the past), allowed the layers to slip over each and every different. They have been layered, just like the pages of a paperback e-book when folded. Some folds prolonged and overlapped the adjoining terrain.
Erosion then took its toll: the absolute best parts have been essentially the most significantly attacked, in order that every now and then best the inverted a part of the fold remained. Some portions of the folds display vertical layers, onerous portions face up to erosion and shape crests.
Geological construction of the height area of Bugarač. North is at the left, South is at the proper. The folds due to this fact flowed to the north. Considered one of them has slipped and overlaps the more recent layers. Supplied by way of the creator
The particular aid is said to the construction of the entire, which is the results of a horizontal fold. The higher layers are due to this fact older (Jurassic, 135 million years) than the decrease layers (Cretaceous, 80 million years), which has earned it the recognition of the “inverted mountain”.
A novel geology that fed myths
Positive parts of geology associated with this phenomenon, which don’t seem to be exceptional in themselves, however give this remoted mountain an excessively particular look, have contributed to the mythology of this position. The mountain was once supposed to be protecting, because it almost definitely concealed issues in its karst community.
The foundation of the “inverted strata”, geologically, was once slightly obscure, resulting in their being interpreted as “magical”. Creativeness did the remainder.
For a very long time, the height of Bulgarac has been stirring the creativeness of its guests. Arno Lagrange, CC BI-NC-ND
Every other strange medical reality is related to this mountain. Meridian 0 passes 2 kilometers from the highest of Bulgaria, and above all, in this mountain, Jean-Baptiste Delambre and Pierre Mechen, astronomers and mathematicians, set probably the most basic milestones of the common metric gadget on the finish of the 18th century. In order that they undertook to measure one finish of the earth’s arc (from Dunkirk to Barcelona, or 1 / 4 of the meridian). This paintings, endured by way of Arago, made it imaginable to outline the “standard meter”, which corresponds to a ten-millionth a part of 1 / 4 of the duration of the terrestrial meridian.
