Moriez

Overview

commune

Where to stay in Moriez

Compare and book on the major platforms. Hotels, campsites and gîtes in Moriez will soon have their verified listing on LiveVerdon.

What to see, what to do

Parish church of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine

The village church, whose apse goes back to the 12th century and whose nave dates from the 15th-16th centuries, enlarged in the 18th century. It keeps a retable of 1609 attributed to François Mimault and a crib of cardboard santons of 1848, both classified as historic objects. (Some local sources give the parish church the dedication of Saint-Barthélemy — a dedication still to be confirmed.)

Chapel of Notre-Dame-du-Serret

A former priory whose stone base goes back to the 11th century, partly rebuilt in the 18th century. The church of Notre-Dame-du-Serret was given to the Abbey of Lérins in the 11th century by Belielda and her sons, evidence of how early religious settlement came to the commune.

Salt spring of la Beaumenière

A salt spring worked from very early times: excavations in 1999 and 2002 dated an almond-wood fascine to 5800-5500 BC, making this one of the oldest known salt workings in Europe. The salt well, rediscovered in 1636, was worked again from 1672. The whole (spring and salt graduation tables) is registered as a historic monument. A local tradition does indeed link the name Moriez to the Latin muria, 'brine', whereas place-name specialists see in it rather the mulberry tree.

Moriez railway viaduct

A stone viaduct on the Nice-Digne line crossing the Grau torrent and the main road at the entrance to the village. The project was approved on 14 October 1890 and built from 1890 onwards to the plans of the engineer Daime: 108.5 m long, with nine arches of 8 m span. The train des Pignes line reached Moriez in 1892.

Fountain of 1644

A public fountain installed in 1644 by Paul de Chailan, joint lord of the place: an octagonal basin and a pillar decorated with four carved faces.

Ruined châteaux and oratories

Remains of a medieval château-vieux (old castle), which keeps gypseries (the staircase vaults, late 16th century), and of a château-neuf (new castle) built in the 18th century by the Chailan family; the oratories of Saint-Raymond (1689) and Saint-Pierre (in ruins), which mark out the area.

History of Moriez

Moriez appears in the texts as early as 1030 (Morierus), then in the 13th century as Moriers; place-name specialists link the name to the Occitan word for the mulberry tree, while a local tradition connects it instead to the Latin muria ('brine'), because of the salt spring in the commune, worked since the Neolithic. In the Middle Ages several churches were given to the Abbey of Lérins; the present village took shape around the church of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine, founded in the 12th century, after the population withdrew from the Coulet-de-Ville plateau, emptied by plague and by the wars of the 14th-15th centuries; the final settlement in the present village is attested in the 15th century. In the 16th-17th centuries the lordship was held by the Chailan family, joint lords, who gave the village a fountain (1644) and reopened the salt well (rediscovered in 1636). The population reached about 850 inhabitants in the early 19th century, before the rural exodus, from 1860 onwards, cut it by half by about 1921. The local economy included a wool-weaving factory (1832-the 1880s) and then lavender distilleries at Hyèges and in the village, active until the 1970s-1980s. The arrival of the railway in 1892 left a lasting mark on the life of the commune; the population has been recovering since the 1990s.