The records of church councils bear witness to the presence of ecclesiae incastellatae across the medieval landscape. The relatively common medieval practice of fortifying churches may appear paradoxical to our modern sensibilities, which tend to regard castles as secular, functional creations of feudalism, and churches as more symbolic expressions of medieval spirituality. Indeed, castles and churches are seldom considered together in the literature on medieval architecture and are normally examined by different scholars. Contrary to the rather arbitrary division of modern scholarship, however, the two sets of monuments were often closely related, sharing common patrons, technological innovations, and designs. Evidence of this association is readily available in contemporary texts as well as in surviving buildings. Patrons responsible for the construction of both military and ecclesiastical buildings can be identified from documentary sources. Gundulf, bishop of Rochester in the late eleventh century, for example, supervised the construction of both the Tower of London and Rochester Cathedral. His contemporary, Benno II, bishop of Osnabrück, is also credited with both castle and church projects. The forms and techniques of single-nave plan, thick-wall construction, intramural gallery passages, stair vises, machicolation, and crenellation, are often shared by castle and church buildings.

Nowhere can this fusion of the secular and religious realms be seen more clearly than in the twelfth-century fortified churches of Maguelone, Agde, and Saint-Pons-de-Thomières. As hybrid fortress-cathedrals and abbeys, these buildings have seldom been incorporated into the history of either ecclesiastical or military architecture.

The fortress-churches of Maguelone, Agde, and Saint-Pons-de-Thomières were integrally involved in the political, social, and religious developments of mid-twelfth-century Languedoc. As three of the major cathedral and abbey churches of the region, they attracted important patrons and resident clergy, hosted kings and popes as visitors, amassed great wealth and prestige, and commissioned impressive architectural complexes. Though other churches and abbeys in the region may have shared their importance and their military aspects, the survival at these three great churches of both documentary and physical evidence of their mid-twelfth-century phases permits a fuller analysis than is possible for other buildings. We will focus in this chapter on a full “reading” of the fabric of each building as well as of the relevant archival sources for each community. In this endeavor we will make frequent reference to primary material. Resumés of the building histories of Maguelone, Agde, and Saint-Pons, from their foundation to the twentieth century, precede the more detailed analysis of the twelfth-century phases of each building. In this regard, we will discuss in detail the observations recorded in the new surveyed plans, measured elevations, and analytic section drawings produced for this book. The most important texts have been assembled in the Appendixes in both the original Latin as well as in new English translations. Identification of the twelfth-century phases of Maguelone, Agde, and Saint-Pons is only possible through detailed analysis of the buildings, careful reading of the archival sources, and critical reevaluation of the secondary sources.

The link between religious refuge and fortification invoked in Psalm 91 was a potent connection during the medieval period. Many religious establishments, whether they were simple parish churches, cathedrals, monasteries, or even cemeteries, were commonly surrounded by a wall or ditch and were often provided with crenellations, iron-barred doors, fortified gates, and other elements of military defense. Under the Peace of God in the tenth and eleventh centuries (and revived in the twelfth century), churches, cemeteries, and other consecrated sites received formal rights of protection. In what was almost a physical realization of Psalm 91, a place dedicated to God acted as a fortress for those in need of refuge.

The decision to fortify a church was, however, not a matter of simple choice for the clerical patron. Permission needed to be sought and granted by the royal, local, or municipal authority. Beginning in the ninth century, permission to fortify was granted to religious patrons by the Carolingians and by their Capetian successors. Italian and German monasteries were also granted the right to build and to own fortifications from the ninth century. Licenses to crenellate were issued by the English chancery as early as the year 1200. Charles Coulson's study of these licenses demonstrates that monastic and episcopal patrons were every bit as eager for the privilege to fortify their buildings as were their secular counterparts.

The pressures that inspired ecclesiastical fortification in twelfth-century Languedoc were multiple and interconnected. The textual records for Maguelone, Agde, and Saint-Pons-de-Thomières describe threats from “Saracens,” pirates, heretics, and foreigners, beginning in the eleventh century. The Chronicon for Maguelone, for example, speaks of fear of Saracen pirates at Maguelone during the late-eleventh-century episcopacy of Arnaud:

Suger of Saint-Denis expressed similar concerns after his visit to the abbey in 1118. In his Life of Louis the Fat, he reports that Maguleone is