whole of this part of Gaul at the time of Caesar’s invasion.  So inhabited was it that the surplus population spread all over the known world, just as the English do to-day.  The popular notion with regard to the needles is that they were intended to carry lanterns to guide the pilgrims by night either to Figeac or to Roc-Amadour.  Such lanterns were set up in Aquitaine, and some examples may still be seen; but they are very different in character from these obelisks, which in all probability were used to mark the boundary of the salvamentum.  It is true that in the Middle Ages the right of asylum was, as a rule, confined to the sanctuary itself or its immediate precincts; but there were exceptions, especially in the South of France, where this sacred zone, which in the Romance language was termed the sauvetat, often extended a considerable distance beyond the walls of a monastic town.  Within these bounds persons fleeing from pursuers had the right of asylum; but, on the other hand, there are documents to show that those who committed crimes inside the limit were held guilty of sacrilege.

Early in the Middle Ages the town of Figeac enjoyed the privileges of a royal borough under the protection of the kings of France, who in course of time came to be represented there by their viguier (vicar).  The civic administration was in the hands of consuls as early as the year 1001.  They rendered justice and even passed sentence of death.  The burghers were exempt from all taxation and servitude.  The municipality had the right of coining money for the king, and the ruined mint can still be seen.  Such was the state of things down to the time when the English appeared in the country.  Henry II., having taken Cahors in 1154, left his chancellor, Becket, there as governor.  The Figeacois, who at first looked upon Becket as an enemy, after he was murdered at Canterbury, and when the fame of his saintliness began to spread through France, dedicated a church to him.  This edifice has disappeared; but the part of the town where it was situated, or where, to speak more correctly, it was afterwards rebuilt, is still called the Quartier St. Thomas.  So little were the English loved, however, as a nation by the Quercynois, that, after St. Louis had been canonized, they refused to observe his festival, because they found it impossible to forgive him for having, by the treaty of Abbeville, passed them over to England without their consent.

Figeac was less troubled than some other towns in the Quercy by the English, because in different treaties the kings of France managed to keep a grip upon it as a royal borough.

The gates of the town were, however, thrown open to the English without a struggle about the middle of the fourteenth century, and to punish the consuls, when they again became French, King John took away their right to coin money; but the privilege was restored in consideration of the ardour they had shown in freeing themselves from the British yoke.