Nice hinterland,
rugged, picturesque mountain villages
Clinging to the side of the mountain, at the edge of small torrent rivers, sometimes perched on an eagle's nest ridge, elsewhere well installed in "circulade" on a high croup, or on a shoulder forming a plateau, the villages, the small towns we visited offer an original picturesque.
This is how we will see with great satisfaction the villages of Belvédère, Coaraze, La Bollène-Vésubie, Lucéram, Pied-Haute, Roquebillière-haut, St-Martin-Vésubie, and Sospel.
Belvedere (830m)
hilltop village on the upper left bank of the valley of the Vésubie.
The vegetation in the foreground here masks the escarpment.
The photo is taken from Roquebillière-haut, on a clifftop plateau on the other side of the valley, above the right bank of the Vésubie.
All were founded before or during the long Middle Ages, have known the vagaries of countries in between (between Rome and Gaul, between Provence and Piedmont, between France and Italy ...).
With their procession of occupation by the lansquenets of François 1st or Charles Quint, by the troops of well-paid soldiers of Louis XIV, those of the French revolutionaries, fiery and plunderers.
Few remember the Saracen period (however evoked in Lucéram), too distant, and which was confined to a large fringe of the area. coastal.
Besides the historical context, most, over the centuries, have known and shared all kinds of catastrophes:
- landslides (November 1929 from Belvédère to Roquebillière bas), avalanches,
- plague (1347, 1629 ...) or cholera (1764 ...),
- earthquakes (614, 1348 however disputed, 1494 felt violently until Nice; 1564, one of the most violent than the local territory have known, called the "Nissart earthquake"; then others in 1566, 1618, 1644, all very destructive ...).
Nice high country, covered passages, alleys, "cantouns" and "pontis"
The stairways are very steep, weave, meander, pass under vaults.
When they are Covered and take the form of large tunnels in never-before-seen corners under houses, or hewn in the rock, often surprising and complicated, plunging here, rising there, with obscure twilight which were perhaps cut throats and today refuge for lovers, we call them "cantouns", or "pontis".
Even on the Coaraze nipple which has more space than a spur, we have built these "cantouns".
Those of Lucéram become real mazes, sink or release high ceilings, marry and use with precision the tormented topography of the site.
In Piedne-Haute, on the narrow crest of the promontory, some are dug into the rock. Others hurtle down the side slope towards the precipice (not shown in the slideshow) where they seem to be sucked in.
Same Sospel, the old and prosperous viguerie established however on a vast plateau with modest relief, offers some.
Yes we threw over a passage constructions that make like a bridge (does the term "pontis" come from?), it was first for save space for dwellings and attics.
Some specialists say that it is also for consolidate by binding them thus groups of dwellings, in order to better resist the frequent local earthquakes.
A "pontis" at Belvédère
Nice high country,
some examples of village houses
houses in Belvédère
In any case, we observe a great diversity of configurations that we owe to the necessary adaptation to the relief of the chosen location: site of subsistence, passage and refuge all at the same time.
The cramped bedrock often made it necessary to build narrow, tall houses or small buildings.
The most typical example is that of Belvédère, with its houses which have at least 3 floors, side by side in a compact way.
The houses of St-Martin-Vésubie are of the same inspiration.
But there, some of them, tall and very narrow, are particularized by the way in which they stand out ostensibly. groups of neighboring houses are positioned in gable with corbelled around the central street which runs down the descending ridge of the village.
Wealthy owners who wanted to mark their rank?
And if beautiful and tall houses also embellish Sospel, they owe it more to the prosperity of the city between the 16th and 18th centuries than to the constraint of available space.
Nice high country, stairs and village squares
The steep-sided staircases with irregular steps, often paved, sometimes streaked with regular relief to avoid slipping, the alleys they serve, present a variety that we never tire of.
in Lucéram
They open out between short terraces on bright plots.
in Coaraze
in Piedne-Haute
Haut-pats of Nice,
washhouses and fountains in the villages
in Lucéram
From Wash houses, fountains, scrupulously restored complete the touch of authenticity, in this region where the hot and dry climate finds a perfect compensation in the waters of the mountain torrents.
The wash house of Sospel on the bank of the Bévéra is superbly decorated with a trompe-l'oeil and takes on an antique tone.
Another in Coaraze, a simple rectangular water mirror is covered with a very simple and superb framework redone; one of the mouths of water is a head of a sea god with aquatic ears, baroque face.
One again other very beautiful in Lucéram.
A round or semi-circular fountain in Sospel, a drinking fountain in Coaraze where an old inscription says "it is forbidden to wash anything at the trough, "a tiny corner fountain in a beautiful sloping alley in Lucéram, charms nooks and shadows.
interior of the wash house of Sospel
Squares and forecourt, arcades and bell towers,
it's Italy
The high walls or the pretty shutters of old houses sometimes enchant with colors that are a scarf of warm light to the eye.
The alleys emerge on the square of a chapel or a church, run alongside the doors of almost troglodyte cellars, or the entrance steps of the porches of bourgeois houses.
Certain places of severe stones, like that of the church of Coaraze, offer the arid calm of the small Spanish villages, the red and yellow tones as a bonus.
Does the oath to the Infant of Spain made by this village to the Spaniards (Gallispans) during the War of the Austrian Succession (1744 to 1749) have something to do with it?
The facades, the stairs are adorned with trompe-l'oeil, the most modern of which are not necessarily the most successful but remain a beautiful realism (Belvedere).
On the discreet steps of the small baroque church of Piedne-Haute, under construction, we accidentally disturb a small group of illegal African immigrants, undoubtedly hidden there, probably coming from Ventimiglia via the Roya valley below, and waiting for a ferryman.
We move away to avoid further embarrassment. On several occasions, a small squadron of gendarmerie stopped and opened the trunk of cars passing at an important neighboring crossroads.
The palm of the picturesque and the charm goes undoubtedly to the central place of Sospel.
The superb, quite asymmetrical harmony of the tall houses on arcades, facing three baroque churches around the vast sandstone pebble square is a real treat, reminding others beautiful and famous Italian squares.
The old bridge, however restored and even partially reconstructed during successive damage, seems immovable on the meager Bévéra.
at Belvédère
in Lucéram
The old bridge of Sospel
Nice high country, sign lintels and gnomonic
Sometimes a simple stone lintel identifies a sign, like that of a blacksmith in Coaraze, a date of construction (1570) with a mysterious mention in Lucéram, an isolated baroque decoration above a door opening onto a staircase in La Bollène-Vésubie.
Some squares or houses also proudly display sundials.
In the light of the Alpine countries, the ancestral art of the makers of sundials, the gnomonic, is almost a banality (the gnomon is the rod fixed on the plane of the dial whose shadow is projected on it and indicates the time).
This art flourished in the 17th and 18th centuries.
A little fallen into disuse then, a renewed interest arouses towards the middle of the 20th century the creation of other modern works this time.
So, Coaraze made appeal to celebrities (Cocteau, Goetz, ...) for create modern versions, in particular on the facade of its town hall which is also a post office. Which thus becomes a work of art.
Another beautiful dial signed Christine Vallin (date unknown but from modern times) hides a little too much under the beautiful awning of a 19th century building in St-Martin-Vésubie. Backbiters say he never sees the sun. The height for a ... sundial.
The precipices are close, border the dwellings, offer in a narrow perspective a glimpse of the gaze towards other distant slopes dazzled by the sun.
In Coaraze, next to the watering hole in the church square, a sundial signed Ben