The village of Thezan is a circulade.

This says a number of things about it, not least that it has been a settlement since, at the latest, medieval times.

I'm not going to go into a long discourse about circulades here but they are particular and peculiar to this area of Langedoc Rousillon.

The way a circulade village was first described to me was that it is like a snail's shell - a rising spiral.
They were constructed thus, on a hill, for defensive purposes there being only the one way in and the same way out. And the most important buildings tended to be towards the top of the rise: in Thezan's case the church is at the very summit.

This is the view of Thezan's church tower from our bedroom in Le Presbytere.
From this perspective it appears to sit, almost squatly, on the church roof........

.................whereas, in fact, it rises tall, not only above the church roof but all the roofs of the town.

This is the view one has of it as one enters Thezan from the main Beziers / Murviel road.............

............and thereafter it can be seen from almost any gap between buildings from near and far.

Yesterday Sue and I went for a walk to Corneilhan the next village to Thezan towards Beziers and halfway between the two villages, deep amongst the vineyards, the Thezan church tower still stood proud.

And on this walk there were carpets of spring wild flowers..........

In this bunch that she picked along the way, Sue estimated that there may have been as many as forty different flowers............. And what is in the background? What else but Thezan's church tower.