SOUTERRAINS
escaped did so by taking advantage of the subterranean refuges either natural or artificial that abounded. And that they did so is shown by the relics of Merovingian times that have been found in them.
The Mussulmans were routed at Poitiers by Charles Martel. Three hundred thousand Saracens, say the old chroniclers, with their usual exaggeration, fell before the swords of the Christians. The rest fled under the walls of Narbonne.
Between 752 and 759 Pepin the Short resolved on the conquest of Septimania, i.e. Lower Languedoc. The Goths there had risen against the Arabs and appealed for his aid. Nimes, Agde, Beziers, Carcassonne opened their gates, but Narbonne resisted for seven years. When it surrendered in 759, the Empire of the Franks for the first time touched the Eastern Pyrenees. Pepin now picked a quarrel with Waifre, Duke of Aquitaine, and crossing the Loire made of the unhappy country a hunting-ground for the Franks. He delivered the land over to a systematic devastation. From the Loire to the Garonne the houses were burnt, and the trees cut down. "The churches, the monasteries, and secular buildings were reduced to ashes. Vineyards and fields were ravaged, and the inhabitants put to the edge of the sword. Only a few strong places escaped the fury of the soldiers. . . . The city of Cahors fell into the power of the conqueror and was reduced to the same pitiable condition into which it had been brought by the Saracens. The inhabitants of Quercy who survived owed this to the subterranean retreats which they had made and to the caverns in the rocks that had served them as refuges during the incursion of the infidels. The principal caves are situated on the Banks of the Lot at Cami, Luzech, Vers, Bouzier, S. Cirq, La Toulsanie, Larnagol, Calvignac, S. Jean de Laur, Cajarc and Laroque-Toirac, to above Capdenac; on the banks of the Célé, at Roquefort, Espagnac, Brengues,
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