Apartment Bordighera

West of Arles, the takes you through the drier parts of the Camargue. After crossing the Petit Rhone,you're in the Petite Camargue, in the departementoftbe Gard, approaching St-Gil|es the only town for miles in any direction.<br />
In medieval times and earlier, St-Gilles was a flourishing port, much nearer the sea than it is now. Remains have been found of a Phoenician merchant colony, and the Greek-Celtic oppidum that replaced it, but the place did not really blossom until the nth century.The popes and the monks of Cluny, who owned it, conspired to make the resting place of Gilles, an obscure 8th-century Greek hermit, a major stop along the great pilgrim road to Compostela.The powerful countsofToulouse helped too-the family originally carnefrom St-Gilles. Soon pilgrims were pouring infrom asfar awayas Germany and Poland,the port boomedwith the onset of the Crusades, and both theTemplars and Knights Hospitallers (who owned large tracts in the Camargue) built important commanderies. In 1116 the abbey church of St-Gilles was begun, one of the most ambitious projects ever undertaken in medieval Provence.<br />
Destiny, however, soon began making it clear that this was not the place. As the delta graduallyexpanded, the canalssiltedup and St-Gilles could no longerfunction asa port.<br />
The realdisaster carne with the Warsof Religion.when the town became a Protesta nt stronghold; the leaders of the Protestant army thought the church, that obsolete relicfrom the Age of Faith that took 20oyears to build, would look much better as a fortress, andtheydemolished nearly ali ofit tothatend.lt was rebuilt, in a much smaller version, after 1650. What was left suffered more indignities during the Revolution -the loss of many of the figures faces is nothing short of tragic- but it is a miracle that othervvise one of the greatest ensembles of medieval sculpture has surviveo more or less intact.</p>";