LES MARTYS
Canton of Mas-Cabardès, Aude, France.
Ore refinery N of Carcassone in the Montagne
Noire (considered a part of the Cévennes in antiquity),
in a region rich in mineral resources and marked by
numerous traces of ancient and mediaeval mining operations. The best known site (Domaine des Forges) consists of large and widespread ancient deposits of iron
dross, worked in recent decades for the sake of the
metal. The site is marked at various points by the remains of walls belonging to Gallo-Roman industrial
buildings. The artifacts that are found mixed with the
dross consist largely of metal tools, ceramics, glassware,
coins, and other objects.
The ores of Les Martys consisted of haematite and
limonite, which could be worked for iron but seem to
have been exploited primarily for the gold and silver
they contain, a fact which explains the enormous mass
of dross covering several ha. To judge from the surviving artifacts, the main period of activity was from the
1st to the 2d c. B.C.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
M. Labrousse, “Bxploitation d'or et
d'argent dans le Rouergue et l'Albigeois,”
Fédération
Historique du Languedoc et du Roussillon (1958) 91-106; “Informations,”
Gallia 20 (1962) 615; 31 (1973)
478-79
I.
G. BARRUOL
