Saint-Julien-le-Montagnier

Overview

A commune in the Var (83), officially named 'Saint-Julien', arrondissement of Brignoles, part of the Communauté de communes Provence Verdon, within the territory of the Parc naturel régional du Verdon. INSEE code 83113, postal code 83560.

Where to stay in Saint-Julien-le-Montagnier

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What to see, what to do

The perched old village and belvedere

A former stronghold perched on its knoll, its lanes lined with fine notables' houses, ornate porches and cellars carved into the rock. From the orientation table, on a clear day the panorama takes in as many as seven départements.

Parish church of Saint-Julien (Sainte-Trinité)

A jewel of Provençal Romanesque art, built between the late 11th and early 12th century, illustrating the transition from early to classical Romanesque. A central nave of four bays with a barrel vault, two side aisles (the north one from the 16th century with rib vaults, the south one Romanesque with a barrel vault), a false transept, and a half-dome apse flanked by two apsidioles; the choir is lit by a lantern tower. It preserves a 17th-century gilded-wood high altar and a rood beam. Twenty-four objects are protected here as Monuments historiques, including a bell cast by Huart in 1726. Sources are uncertain about the exact dedication (Saint-Julien-et-Sainte-Trinité, or Sainte-Trinité).

Ramparts and the Gourdane gate

The old village preserves sections of its medieval wall, often built into the houses, as well as fortified gates and towers. The Gourdane gate (or tower), quadrangular and pierced with a pointed arch, opens to the north-west towards the area of the mills. Sources date it variously to the 12th or 13th century.

Ruins of the feudal castle

The remains of the seigneurial fortress at the top of the knoll (a cistern, the foundations of a keep), next to partly restored sections of the ramparts.

Mills of the plateau

Two restored mills stand on the plateau to the north-west of the old village, in the Gourdane area.

Chapel of la Trinité

Located on the plain, about 500 m west of the old village.

Chapel of l'Annonciade

Located in the Gourdane mills area; it houses altarpieces.

Oppidum of Malavalasse

The site of a Ligurian-period oppidum (the Albici tribe), a witness to protohistoric occupation. The Chalcolithic is also attested at the Pignolets cave.

History of Saint-Julien-le-Montagnier

The area was frequented from prehistoric times (the Pignolets cave, Chalcolithic) and in the Ligurian period (the oppidum of Malavalasse, the Albici tribe), then the Roman period (villas, a crossroads position between Riez, Rians and Saint-Maximin). The earliest known lord of the seigneury, in 1178, was Laure de Saint-Julien, whose beauty was sung by the troubadour Folquet de Marseille and who married Guillaume le Gros, viscount of Marseille. The place appears in the archives in 1182 under the name Sanctus-Julianus-Montanerius. United with the royal domain of Provence in 1309, it passed to the Hospitallers of Saint John of Jerusalem in 1312, then was acquired in 1322 by Arnaud de Trian, Count of Alife and nephew of Pope John XXII. In 1435, through the marriage of Marguerite de Trians to Georges de Castellane-Salernes, the seigneury entered the Castellane family for more than three centuries. In the early modern period, improved security favoured the growth of the agricultural hamlets on the plain, to the detriment of the perched old village. In 1929, after a local debate, the administrative centre was transferred from the old village to the more accessible hamlet of Saint-Pierre. Among the families linked to its land, the commune counted that of the writer Charles Maurras, whose family came from the hamlet of Les Maurras.

Events & highlights

Village festival — August

A traditional summer festival.