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Origin and history

The town of Berniquaut, located in the municipality of Sorèze (Tarn), is an archaeological site occupying a rocky ridge at 568 meters above sea level, on the northern slope of the Black Mountain. Habited for more than 30,000 years, it successively houses prehistoric and then Gallic communities, attracted by its natural defensive character. A 700-metre-long system of Gallic earth lifts bears witness to its strategic role before the Roman conquest. In the Gallo-Roman era (Pax Romana, c. -50), the site was gradually abandoned to the nearby plains, where agricultural settlements were developing.

Between the 11th and 12th centuries, the oppidum became a medieval castrum, mentioned under the names of castellare, castellare or bastimentum between 1046 and 1141. Archaeological excavations revealed more than 100 lodges, suggesting a population of several hundred inhabitants dedicated to crafts, pastoralism and mining. On the northern slope, a medieval mining site spans 9 km, where the inhabitants extract iron hydroxides around 1100. The decline of the site occurred at the beginning of the thirteenth century, its occupiers migrated to Sorèze (around its abbey founded between the eighth and ninth centuries) and Durfort, a castelnau under the authority of the lords of Roquefort.

Ranked in 2002 as a remarkable protected site by the Ministry of the Environment, Berniquaut is now a popular tourist destination for its hikes, paragliding and gazebo offering views of the Revel plain. The visit is enriched by didactic panels and works to enhance medieval ramparts, while its history, from Prehistory to the Middle Ages, makes it a unique testimony to human occupation in Occitanie.

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