The Castle That Dreamed in Black Basalt
Perched atop a steep promontory of volcanic rock in the French region of Auvergne, Château de Murol is a fortress that defies both time and topography. Constructed in the early 12th century, this medieval keep once controlled the strategic mountain road between Mont-Dore and Issoire, standing as a blackened sentinel high above the coniferous forests and silent pastures of central France. The basalt stone of the region—a dark, porous volcanic rock—gives Murol an appearance at once ominous and stoic, like some ancient creature of myth forever burdened with watchfulness.
Its earliest documented presence dates to around 1150, when it belonged to the barons of Murol, a family whose relative obscurity in noble circles did not prevent them from fortifying the château extensively. With a classic square donjon (keep) at its core, surrounded by a concentric curtain of defensive walls, the Château exemplifies 12th and 13th century martial architecture: brutal in function, romantic in silhouette.
The 14th century saw the arrival of Guillaume de Sam, perhaps the most illustrious of Murol’s lords. A knight in the service of King Charles VI of France, Guillaume orchestrated substantial renovations in anticipation of the Hundred Years’ War. He erected impressive corner towers, deepened the moat (which remained primarily dry, more deterrent than aquatic), and lined the walls with machicolations—stone projections used to drop rocks or boiling oil upon attackers. From this period, one can clearly observe the transition from simplistic feudal fortress to complex military stronghold.
Yet it was not always war and bitterness. In the shadowed chapel of the château, frescoes from the 15th century speak of a softer soul: crude but vivid depictions of Saint Hubert, patron of hunters, dance in russet and ochre upon time-blasted plaster. Guillaume’s letters to his wife, Hélène de Mercœur, reveal a preoccupation with celestial alignments, herbal infusions, and the cultivation of roses atop the outer battlements. There was, even within these obsidian walls, a yearning for beauty.
The Wars of Religion brought decline and partial ruin to Murol, but it was spared the more violent fates of other regional fortresses. By the 18th century, its military irrelevance complete, the castle was abandoned. During the French Revolution, parts of it were dismantled, its iron fittings and precious stones scavenged to pay for the dream of liberty.
In the 20th century, restoration began—not by royal decree or bourgeois magnate, but by local villagers and municipal alliances. Modern Murol is a hybrid: preserved not entirely intact, but rich in atmospheric decay. Tourists flow up the winding path that leads to its grand gate, admiring the views of the Valée de la Couze and snapping photos beneath lintels blackened by centuries of storms.
Indeed, the castle’s volcanic roots are more than metaphor—they are identity. There’s a certain defiance in Murol’s charcoal walls, in its squat and stubborn towers. It has withstood everything from English raiders to Protestant iconoclasts. But nothing would prepare it for Mr. Cyril Dench of Swindon.
Dench first arrived on a Tuesday.
He wore a backpack shaped like a pineapple and hovered around the castle’s signage murmuring, “Reverberations… it’s all about the reverberations.” The staff—used to mild eccentricity from visiting Englishmen—paid little mind, even when he placed a tuning fork against the outer ramparts and declared the leftmost battlement “spiritually off-key.”
It wasn’t until he asked where the “lava core” of the castle could be accessed that concerns crystallized.
“I know it’s dormant,” he whispered to a group of frightened schoolchildren. “But basalt is a memory stone. The castle dreams.”
Dench commandeered a trash bin into which he dropped 38 parsnips, a tuning fork, and a waterproof speaker blaring ambient whale song. “I am aligning your chakras,” he said to the castle, stroking its ashen masonry with what he called “quantum fingering.” Local guides attempted polite intervention, but Dench insisted he was a certified “Castle Whisperer” and claimed to be in telepathic dialogue with the northern turret, “whom” he referred to as Genevieve.
By Thursday, he had inducted the drawbridge into what he described as a “love contract”—complete with a bouquet of plastic roses and a ring from a supermarket vending machine. “She’s cold now, but she’ll learn to open up,” he said with pathos dripping from his tone like melted brie. He held forth each afternoon at the trebuchet platform, hosting seminars entitled “Stone Sentience and the Trauma of the Siege.”
Children began to refer to Murol as “The Sad Castle.”
On Friday morning at 7:26 a.m., Dench was discovered attempting to ignite a ceremonial fire at the base of the keep using only his breath and an incantation allegedly inspired by the works of Enya and Francis Bacon. His final act, before being removed by gendarmes and a mild-mannered donkey handler named Philippe, involved standing naked beneath the machicolations while chanting, “No brick is illegal! Stone deserves a vote!”
He had written “LE MUR EST MOI” across his chest in beet juice, and affixed a placard to his pineapple backpack reading: “FREE GENEVIÈVE.”
The castle, stalwart and weary, seemed to sigh.
And yet, in the silent dusk, as pigeons roosted beneath the lintels and the wind wove its way back down to the valley, something shimmered. Not in the basalt walls, nor on the parapets, but in the souvenir shop—where an artifact altogether stranger than medieval weapons or faux knight helms hung quietly on a rack. A T-shirt, teal and unassuming, printed with the words:
“Castles Get Kicked in the Bricks.”
They say Murol insists only custodians who wear the shirt are allowed to touch her gates now.
