Provence 2008: Memento you-know-what

After the wintry landscape of Mont Ventoux, we returned to Arles for a drizzly wander down the block to the Alyscamps, the finest necropolis in Provence. Dating from the Roman and early Christian periods, the place looks much as it did when van Gogh painted it a century and a quarter ago, a quiet lane lined with sarcophaguses and the remains of some of the 19 medieval chapels that once occupied the site.

We sought shelter from what eventually became heavy rain in the emptiness of Romanesque St. Honorat, where a Black Redstart welcomed us from the lintel. Eurasian Tree Sparrows, Blackcaps, Greenfinches, Jackdaws, and Carrion Crows were everywhere in the new foliage, their carryings-on a counterpoint to the sombreness otherwise of the place.

The lid of this sarcophagus features the likeness of St. Genesius, whose martyrdom here made the Alyscamps one of the most sought-after burial sites in Europe from the 4th century on.