by Mary Ann Anderson

The ochre cliffs and quarries surrounding the village of Roussillon in Provence are smeared with all the colors of a fiery inferno: burnt orange, blazing yellow, searing gold, and most notably, a flaming red that is so rich and dark that it seems steeped in blood. And from these fabled colors sprang a legend in this small French countryside village.

No one can say when the story took place, maybe the Dark Ages or even during the Renaissance, but it is told like this:

Raymond d'Avignon, the lord of Roussillon, was married to Lady Sermond, perhaps the prettiest women in the village. While Lord D'Avignon loved his wife, he was passionate about hunting, which took him away from home for lengthy periods of time.

Lady Sermond was often lonely, so she began an affair with a man named Guillaume de Cabestan. When Lord d'Avignon returned from one of his hunting trips, he learned of Sermond and Guillaume's trysts. Although d'Avignon was seething with rage at Sermond's indiscre-tions, he befriended Guillaume, but only as a ruse to invite him on a hunt, where in a jealous rage, he killed his wife's lover.

When Lord d'Avignon went back to his mountaintop castle that evening, he prepared a special meal for Sermond. When she finished her dinner, she told her husband that it was the most scrumptious meal that she had ever eaten, and she pressed him to tell her what kind of meat he had served.

Lord d'Avignon savored the moment before cruelly replying, "You have just eaten the heart of your lover, Guillaume."

So completely distraught and hysterical was Sermond that she rushed to the edge of the mountain and threw herself to her death on the jagged rocks below. And now, legend holds, it is her blood that stains the earth red in these ochre cliffs of Roussillon.

Whether or not this ultimate crime of passion is true, it is romantic enough for the cliffs to remain one of the most popular tourist spots in the entire Provence region of France. (CONTINUE...)