Albi cathedral and palace

Albi wasn’t an important Cathar centre but it gave its name — Albigensian — to both the heresy and the crusade that the pope launched to eradicate it.

The crusade was also indirectly responsible for one of the most remarkable cathedrals I’ve seen in Europe.

You’d never guess the riches it contains by looking at the outside. The Cathédrale Sainte-Cécile looks more like a grim brick fortress than a church. Built after the end of the crusade, it was meant as a demonstration of the bishop’s power and his fierce opposition to heresy. 

It is a masterpiece of the Southern French Gothic and is said to be the largest brick building in the world.

The interior is a soaring world of intricate detail.

Its vaulted ceilings are a carnival of lustrous gold and indigo.

A delicately carved stone rood screen surrounds the choir, separating clergy from nave and aisle. Carvings of New Testament figures surround the interior, carefully matched with their corresponding Old Testament counterpart around the outside.

Rood screens were once the norm in many parts of Europe but nearly all were removed from Catholic churches during the Counter-Reformation in the wake of the Council of Trent. This is one of the very few surviving examples, and surely the most beautiful.

At the front of the cathedral behind the main altar is a massive reminder for those who aren’t feeling sufficiently penitent despite the presence of so many carved saints.

The wall-spanning fresco of the Last Judgement was painted at the end of the 15th century. The deceased on the left are about to be admitted to heaven, where they will presumably spend eternity reading and rereading the holy books or talking dogma with the likes of St. Augustine.

Those on the right are being dragged down to hell by a vivid assortment of monsters and demons. It is unclear whether their sins would continue throughout their blessed torture, but given the dull celestial alternative, this sinner is betting on eternal fornication.

Regardless of which side of the fresco you’re on, you should spend at least a couple hours taking a close look at the statues, paintings and structures inside this remarkable cathedral, helped by their excellent audio guide.

And don’t worry, you won’t be converted. Not if you take a quick walk to the bishop’s palace next door — the Palais épiscopal de la Berbie — to lose yourself in the world of Toulouse-Lautrec.

The diminutive French painter chronicled the Paris nightlife, capturing normal people in their working environments — including the brothels and seedy salons of Montmartre — stripped of glamour and with a touch of world-weary innocence.

He also designed the legendary posters for the Moulin-Rouge, several of which you can see on display.

Built of brick that matches the cathedral, the Berbie palace’s bastions, machicolation and walls strike a suitably intimidating note from below, even when looking at the beautiful French-style garden next to the river Tarn.