Book: Diego Lara has just published “Montricoux and the Templars”

For over forty years, Diego Lara, a passionate curator and prolific author, has devoted his energy to preserving the region's history and culture. Based in the small picturesque village of Montricoux, he runs a museum that he himself founded around fifteen years ago, dedicated to local artists, among others. At the same time, he ardently pursued writing work, and his latest work, the nineteenth of his career, is now completed. This new opus delves into the rich Templar past of Montricoux, a village to which Diego is particularly attached. “The history of the Templars in Montricoux lasted 128 years, a fascinating chapter that I wanted to bring back to light,” he confides. The book is based on an unpublished manuscript, written in 1953 by Roger-François Vilade, then mayor of Montricoux and guardian of local memory. While in the 1980s, Yvette Clavières, town hall secretary, allowed Diego to access the municipal archives, and to consult this unique history.

“This transcription work was not without its challenges, despite its condition,” he explains, “the difficulty lay in the reading, which was sometimes almost illegible, and gave him a hard time.”

Over the years, Diego has been able to combine his passion for art and History. In addition to the numerous works that he has also devoted to painters and sculptors (Cadène, Andrieu, Bergère, Rolland-Rotgès, Chalanda, etc.), he strives to transmit local memory through his historical research. This latest book testifies to this ambition, breathing new life into an often overlooked past. With this new book, Diego Lara is once again part of a process of heritage transmission.