![]() ![]() ![]() In his guide Aymeric describes the French Way as a mass itinerary, with thousands of people going towards Compostela. Unfortunately, it became known in recent years for its theft in the hands of a cathedral worker in 2011, although it was found and returned to his place in 2012. It is what today we would call a kind of tourist guide and, because of its antiquity, the codex is invaluable. This clergyman describes with great thoroughness the routes to Santiago de Compostela, as well as the sanctuaries that can be found in its ways and also gives advice and anecdotes that could prove useful for pilgrims. The Codex Calixtinus is of great interest because besides including stories about miracles and the apostle, it also shows a book attributed to a French monk called Aymeric Picaud. The court went on to say that it was Charlemagne himself who had discovered the remains of the apostle.īook IV of the Codex Calixtino (photo courtesy of Manuel on Flickr under the following conditions) France, because of its border position, became the main place of passage for entry into the Iberian Peninsula.Ĭharlemagne’s court in the 10th century also served as an advertising spot for the pilgrimage to Santiago, since if the north of the peninsula were to become Christian again they would not have to worry about the pressure that the Arabs made in their border with the Pyrenees. The news of the discovery of the relics of Santiago began to spread throughout Europe in the 9th and 10th centuries. France becomes the point of entry: the importance of the franks This road was already fixed in the 11th century, mainly thanks to kings like Sancho III the Great or Alfonso VI. For that reason, the specification of a marked way to peregrinate was important, since it allowed giving a greater protection to the pilgrims. Moreover, when the pilgrimage started, one of the main problems of the travelers was undoubtedly security. Monastery of the Order of Cluny in Carrión de los Condes (photo courtesy of Miguel Ángel García on Flickr under the following conditions) The Cluniac emerged in the 10th century in France and were a significant existence in Spain because of the large number of hospitals and shelters that they made available to the pilgrims. The kings also gave the Order of Cluny support to create a whole network of monasteries throughout northern Spain. That is why they created new villas and made the Way pass through them. It was a great help for the Crown to assure the territory that was recovered from the Arabs, sending Christian groups to populate the empty territories. The French Way and the towns by which it passes began to be defined from the moment in which the discovery of the relics of the apostle in the 9th century took place. The location of these infrastructures, the protection that some paths received by orders of knights who took care of the pilgrims and the morphology of the land ended up defining the different “roads” that today almost everyone continue to peregrinate. It really does not matter which road you take as long as you get to the destination point, but the large number of people who went to the same place, since the Middle Ages, caused a series of infrastructures to arise to attend their necessities. Pilgrimage means going from an initial point to, in this case, Santiago de Compostela. The sponsorship of the Church and the Crown began to define an itinerary Several texts from the XI century speak of it and it is already described as a “mass phenomenon” in a text written by a monk in the 12th century, known today as the “Codex Calixtino” and considered the first tourist guide of history. The so-called French Way is the Jacobean route par excellence and, undoubtedly, the most traveled at all times in the history of the pilgrimage to Santiago. Arrow formed with stones on a path of the French Way (photo courtesy of Paul Quayle) HISTORY OF THE FRENCH WAY ![]()
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