I've bought a house here in Roquebrun, at the top of the old village, right below the Mediterranean Garden and the tenth century tower. It is probably about 600 feet from the tower, which had extensive fortifications around it, and closer than that to the 14th century church, which again had an abbey and dependances. The house dates from around 1860 and is on four levels: the bottom level is the "cave" which we would call the basement. It consists of a large room, and two smaller ones which are vaulted. I think parts of the vaulted cave date back much farther than the house itself. This village, like so many others, has layers of buildings. Something would fall down or be destroyed by an invading army (such as the Albigensian crusade), and the old foundations and walls reused for the next building. The next level up is the main floor, with the kitchen and living room; above that are three bedrooms and a bathroom, and at the top is a grenier (attic). The grenier was originally for drying chestnuts, and has great views over the river and the Orb Valley. Before I move in, I'm having additional windows installed and the grenier made habitable, including adding a stairway inside the house as the current grenier access is from an outside stairway. The house is built into a hill, so its four stories on one end and only one at the other. Its stone, of course, like all of the village houses, and the walls are two feet thick, which is why I'm not doing the windows myself. There is a large original Languedoc style fireplace, about six feet across (see photos). There are also ruins, two small single story rooms and one larger two story house with a cave. Here you can rebuild legally anything that was once a house, so I will probably do that. There are fewer restrictions on using old walls, or meeting current building codes, than there are in the US. I will probably have possession some time toward the end of April, but not move in until the first of June, as I don't want to be living there when the massive work is being done.
It has a large garden on several levels, and shares no common walls with any other houses, both things being unusual for a village house. Its quite private, as the public park is below me assuring my views, on the west side is my property for probably about fifty feet and then the windowless walls of a neighbor's house, barely visible, and they visit infrequently. The back of the property (north side) is below the road, and the other side (east) has a garden area about 20 feet wide against the two story stone walls, no windows, of the adjacent house. No one overlooks my garden on any side, or can disturb my views. Sweet .....
Now I'm sure you all are wondering, where is the Templar's Treasure? Of course, I will be looking for it. I would be happy with a few pottery shards or better yet a roman coin. There has to be some stuff on this site, Inside the house itself there is an area that has what appear to be two thickesses of interior wall, about two feet thick total, which rise above the vaulted caves below, and I suspect that portion of the house predates the rest of it, or at least those walls were reused in the building of the current house. So I've got another old house to fix up ....
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