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| Magdalena and the Tarusks |
 About twenty centuries BC the Iberians who had come from Asia occupied Spain and Aquitaine. Later, Celts and Iberians together become the ‘Celtiberians’. The Ariege valley was occupied by the Celtiberian tribe of the Sotiates, part of which came from the Aegean Sea. They lived mostly around the region of Ussat and formed the Tarusks country with Tarusko (Tarascon) as its capital.
They knew well the caves of the valley and they were using them already.
Another branch of the Tarusks had settled on the banks of the Rhône river, near Massilia (Marseille). It is to the Rhodanian Tarusks that, according to a legend, Mary Magdalene would have brought with her the holy cup which had received the blood flowing from the chest of the crucified Jesus.
She is said to have settled with her large escort in a ‘balme’ or ‘Baume’ (a term which means cave), the ‘Sainte Baume’ (the Holy Cave) where innumerable followers came to look for healing and recover their strength. Here again, we can find again the same spiritual image, the same idea: cave, initiation, Grail, transmission of a holy power for a perfect healing of body and soul. The same spiritual stream always ready to spring up.
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