returning from the crusades – he asked Bernoline for a place to rest for but a few days…. a few days that turned into years as the pair fell in love.
After a short while the pair married, and lived happily for
two years until one evening while relaxing on the terrace of the castle,
enjoying the evening view of the lake, Bernoline and the knight saw in the sky
– a sublime, brilliant shooting star that seemed to fly across the lake coming
from the Roc de Chere and disappearing over Mt Charbon at the end of the lake. Bernoline was enamored of the star and thought
if she could have it, the star would shine on their love. She aksed her knight to bring it to her and who
was he to refuse the beautiful Bernoline? And so it was that the knight set off
on his journey, crossing alps and roaming forests, asking people he met if they
had seen the brilliant shooting star. Always, the answer was “yes” but it went over the next mountain. So for
one hundred days until, on the edge of a sea, in total despair a mermaid
appears and take pity on him. She agrees
to give him the much coveted star…with just once catch: that he return within
two weeks time by midnight to his love
in Angon – or else Bernoline will pay for the star with her life. Not deterred
the knight galloped off and managed, amazingly, to arrive at the very end of
the lake a half hour before midnight on the last day of the two week time
allowed.
His luck, however, was running thin, and he was delirious with
joy and fatigue. The knight soon realized that he had taken a wrong turn and
was now on the wrong side of the lake in Duingt, too far to ride back around
the lake to Angon by midnight. But all
was not lost as he saw the shadow of a fisherman and his boat on the lake and
he called to him until the fisherman finally acknowledged. However, all is not
how it seems, he barters with the fisherman to take him across the lake back to
his love and it’s then that the man requested a rather unexpected price. He
will take him through the last leg of his journey in return for his soul in 10
years time – for the fisherman is in fact the Devil. An ultimatum dawns on the
knight’s mind as he realizes that his beloved wife will die tonight if he
doesn’t accept the offer. Of course, in the name of love and honor the knight
accepts…. and he is soon again basking in the beauty of his wife. Bernoline was joyous at the knight’s return;
what was once a brilliant shooting star was nothing but craggy rock.
[Duingt is point A. Angon is point B.]
The pair lived happily after… for ten short years until the
knight left his home, his servant passing on the grave news and the details of
this diabolical agreement to Bernoline. At that moment she swears to rescue her
husband from the clutches of the devil…and sure enough Satan appears before
her. He promises to reunite her with her knight on condition that she recognize
him amongst a crowd of bystanders….in the guise of another. She agrees knowing
in her soul that she would recognize him in any skin and so she scrutinizes the
details of everyone that she meets with a magnifying glass, without ever recognizing
her love until one day the devil once again appears before her and says that
her husband has appeared before her no less than ten times in different guises.
Bernoline, desperate from despair ran out into the night and
threw herself into the lake from the top of the Roc de Chere, and since then, when
someone drowns in the bay of Talloires, she holds the body deep under the water
to see if the drowned person might be her love returned in disquise. Thus a macabre and rather sinister collection
of corpses has formed below the calm and beautiful waters of Lac d’Annecy in
the bay of Talloires.
Be careful what you ask for. You may already have it.
The following is a famous painting by Paul Chabas painted at Angon with Mt. Charbon in the background. Perhaps the legend of the Princess of Ango inspired his painting: September Morning.
The following is a famous painting by Paul Chabas painted at Angon with Mt. Charbon in the background. Perhaps the legend of the Princess of Ango inspired his painting: September Morning.
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