For us, therefore, wandering in a “fairyland of travel,” there was something of the joy of the discoverer when the forgotten cathedral town, to which
Today the object of our excursion was the hill of Gergovie, interesting from its geological phenomena, as well as from being the scene of Caesar’s
The first Harry Potter film wowed viewers with its portrayal of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the fictional British boarding school where Harry, Ron, and Hermione came of age while foiling a multitude of evil plots. With its soaring turrets, deep dungeons, and geographic situation in the midst of here-be-dragons landscapes (e.g. the Forbidden Forest and the mermaid-haunted Great Lake), Warner Brothers’ Hogwarts is a fine example of escapism done right.
“The Soldier From Auvergne” is a stirring piece of wartime poetry by British writer and serviceman Henry Baerlein.
It was out of the ‘bottomless’ Lac Pavin that the sorcerers conjured wind and storm by casting a stone into its enchanted waters… -Margaret Roberts
The crag, the precipice, the perilous pass, the castle-crowned hill, the arched bridge, the untutored mountaineer, the ravaging baron, the robber chief, the ugly legendary tale of death, the pretty tale of love and fairyland luck — all these come into the story of Auvergne.
In August 1869, the English poet Algernon Charles Swinburne — one of the leading figures of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood — visited Auvergne with his friend,
“In Auvergne, too, you will find again the homely farms, with great hearths and cupboard-beds…the strange superstitions and beliefs; the markets, the picturesque processions and dances,
“All nations have their omens drear, Their legends wild of woe and fear…” -Sir Walter Scott (1808) An interesting list of Auvergnat folk traditions was
Auvergne has a long tradition of loups-garous (werewolves). In fact, one of the most famous loup-garou legends first appeared in Discours execrable des Sorciers (1602), a book by
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Designed by Paolo Zappalà
