Doors

Geography

Doors is located at the foot of the the Pyrenees, in Bigorre, on the Gave of Pau, in the south-east of Tarbes. The city was built around a rock piton heir to the glacier of Argelès-Gazost and on which the château.
was built The city moreover is served by the railway line from Toulouse to Bayonne. An expressway connects the city to Tarbes towards north (in construction) and Argelès-Gazost with the sud.

Note: the city is available of high-resolution on Google Earth

History

According to the legend, Lourdes draws its name and its blazon (a eagle holding a Truite in its nozzle) from a history going back from the reign to Charlemagne. A Sarrasin of the name of Mirat had taken the city and had been cut off there, besieged by the army of the emperor (in the year 778). An eagle had by chance brought a trout to the Moors and those made some present at Charlemagne to make him believe that they had sufficient vivres to support the seat. Convinced of the difficulty of the company, Charlemagne proposed a market with Mirat, on an idea of Turpin, bishop of the Puy-en-Velay: that it keeps the city, but while agreeing “to go to the virgin”, i.e. to disavow Islam and to convert with the Catholicisme. Mirat accepts, it deposits its weapons with the feet of the black Vierge of Puy and takes for Christian name Lorus , which will give later “Heavy”.

Prehistory

Favorably located between several valleys, the site of Doors is inhabited since prehistory. Traces of occupation, whose tools, jewels, shards of ceramics and burials, were discovered inter alia in Espéluges and in the Caves Arrouza (Neolithic and Bronze Age). More important excavations would probably make it possible to update consequent traces of the habitat protohistoric on the territory of Doors.

Antiquity and Early middle ages

The old story of Lourdes remains little known because of the low number of excavations undertaken on the site of the city until recently. Indeed the work of town planning started by the pilgrimage was not always followed preventive excavations, which probably caused the destruction of many vestiges.
The oppidum of the castle is probably occupied as of I. Roman wall sides were discovered besides during the work carried out by military engineering with the castle with. With this occasion several concise fragments (pieces of statue, fragments of furnace bridge) were put at the day. In the same way to the east of the oppidum, the Peyramale place delivered ancient vestiges to two occasions.
Between 1904 and 1907, during the demolition of the old parish church Saint-Pierre, by the substructions belonging to a temple dedicated to the Supervisions (divinities of water) discovered, were accompanied by fragments of ceramics and three votive furnace bridges employed again in the foundations of the old apse. This building had been then replaced by a church paléochrétienne (with) destroyed by a fire, as attest it the calcination of the parts discovered. A necropolis, whose extent could not be measured, surrounded the place of worship. Traces of this one were released with the foot of the castle, which makes think that it extended to the foot from the oppidum. The sarcophagi, whose dating and chronology are delicate to establish, to some extent were stored at the entry of the château.
In 1990, the installation of the carpark of the place again required preventive excavations. A street dated from I or beginning of (ace of Nimes discovered on the spot) and directed North-South was released. Traces of ruts crossing this trajectory were put at the day, letting think of the presence of another perpendicular way (East-West), which led the specialists to wonder whether Heavy had not developed with the crossing of two ancient routes. Besides some allot Lourdes to Oppidum Novum mentioned in the Itinéraire of Antonin, but the archaeological evidence misses. Moreover, the toponymic data showing the presence of two respectively East-West and North-South axes, just as the discovery of this temple of the Supervisions, shows well that Lourdes developed around a crossroads routier.

The Middle Ages

With the Middle Ages, Doors and its castle are the seat of the count of Bigorre. With the Albigensian Crusade, the castle, considered as one of the bolts of the province, is disputed between various factions. It passes under the domination of the counts de Champagne, also kings of Navarre, then between the hands of the kings of France under Philippe Beautiful the, to be then delivered to the English in 1360 during the Guerre One hundred Year old, and this until the beginning of. They could benefit besides from the strategic situation of the city and sound marché.
Indeed, located at the crossroads of two major axes of communication (towards the Spain in the south, towards Toulouse with the east and the Atlantic in the west), the city shelters a market of rather great importance protected by the count (first mention at the beginning of bearing on the incomes of salt). This market still refers to, and thus remains an important source of revenue for that which is returned main of the château.
The medieval city is drawn up in the east of the castle, and is girded walls (of which there remains only the Tower of Garnavie). It counts approximately 150 fires towards, and 243 at the beginning of.

Rebirth with the Revolution

The city will pass through the crises of and. The parish church is destroyed at the time of the Wars of religion, like the abbey of Saint-EP-with-Bigorre all proche.
However Lourdes can benefit from its situation. It is inter alia a stage on the " road of the bains" of Barèges, whose sources are used to look after the wounded and sick soldiers. The castle remains an important strategic place, " bolt of the Lavedan ".
The population is in increase with, in spite of the famines and epidemics. 2315 inhabitants in 1696, 1189 inhabitants in more between 1730 and 1772 by the greatest number of birth on the deaths. But the crises bring back the population to approximately 2300 at the dawn of the Révolution. Towards 1755, the population is made up from approximately 40% farmers, 40% craftsmen (dominated by the textile) and 8.5% carriers (stone slate and masons) and workmen of the building, more approximately 13% of services (commercial, health…).
Dans the years which follow, agriculture will lose importance vis-a-vis the " functions urbaines" , from which especially the craft industry profits whose manpower increases. The peace signed with the Spain involves the loss of the strategic interest of the castle, which becomes prison. In 1788 it is question besides of removing the garrison of the castle, formed by invalids, and who will be defended by a petition sent to Louis XVI.
During the Revolution, the city is held to provide material and vivres to the revolutionary army because of its strategic position. It counts 2741 inhabitants then. With the creation of the department of the Hautes-Pyrénées in 1790, Lourdes requires to be the seat of the place chief of the new district of the gave, one of the five which account the department. However, Argelès-Gazost is preferred to him from its strategic position inside the Lavedan. The remainder of the functions (of which the court) are installed in Lourdes. The city provides then many volunteers to the armies at the time of the revolutionary wars. The danger is important in 1793 at the time of the war with Spain and the threat of invasion by the Lavedan, not proven. Peace is signed in 1795 and involves the demilitarization of the castle, which again shelters a garrison of invalids starting from 1797.

Revolution with today

During first half of the city thus remains an agricultural borough and of breeding (of pigs inter alia), exploiting stone quarries. In 1858, the Virgin appears on several occasions with Bernadette Soubirous in the Cave of Massabielle, near to the Gave of Pau in the west of the city. A certain enthusiasm seizes then the inhabitants of the surroundings which come to visit the cave, then transformed into vault. The authorities then declare this place of worship like unauthorized: the access to the cave is closed by a barricade and its road closure by local by-law. It is withdrawn at the beginning of October 1858 after the apprehension of several hundreds of people, of which of the monks. In 1862 the Appearances are recognized officially by Mgr Laurence, bishop of Tarbes. Work of the sanctuaries begins the same year on the level from the cave, then continue with the crypt which is completed in 1866.
One will need several tens of years however so that the city becomes quoted mariale. To the west of the castle, between the gave, the sanctuaries and the castle, the city mariale will develop. The municipality of Doors, under the pressure of the religious authorities and in spite of the local opposition, will have to widen the streets of the medieval city, and to build the boulevard of the Cave (1879 - 1881), circumventing the castle by north and driving with the sanctuaries. The grounds are then parcelled out, with construction of shops and hotels to accommodate the pèlerins.
At the end of, Lourdes obtains a new parish church. The old one, dedicated to Saint-Pierre, are shaven in 1904. Furniture is transferred from it to the castle, and of the excavations are carried out and which will lead to the discoveries stated higher. Doors then becomes gradually the place of Pèlerinage international Catholique that one knows today with Fátima, Rome, Czestochowa and Guadalupe.

Economy

Tourism and the Pilgrimage

Doors accommodates each year more than 5 million visitors come from the whole world. Its 230 hotels place it at the third rank of the hotel cities of France after Paris and Nice.
The essence of the Lourdian economy rests on the tourist activity related to the pilgrimages. Five hundred pilgrimages take place each year. The multitude reaches its in May maximum, month of Mary, and in August, for Assomption.
The many souvenir shops, concentrated along the street and of the boulevard of the Cave like to the direct accesses of the sanctuaries, appear sometimes, at more or less critical ends for some, the merchants of the Temple. The few normally foreign shops of luxury at a city however modest, symbolize this basket.

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