The villages which lie at the foot of these rocky hills are built of stones taken from the beds of the streams, and are so completely of one colour with the background of rock, that in many instances it is difficult to determine whether a distant mass of grey is a village or not.

Ruined castles and towers abound; and these, and still more the walls which surround many of the villages, point unmistakeably to times of great disturbance.

The valley of the Drome, up which the road after a time turns, was an important locality in the religious wars; and the town and fort of Crest especially, as its name might suggest, was a famous stronghold, and resisted all the efforts of the Reformed party.
In yet earlier times, Simon de Montfort had frequently tried to take it, without success; and four years after S.Bartholomew, Lesdiguieres met with a like repulse.[91] The same story of sieges and battles might be told of almost every village and defile of the valley.

Thus, Saillans, the third stage, was taken by the Protestant leader Mirabel, and the Catholic Gordes, in 1574, and its fortifications were razed by the Duc de Mayenne in 1581.

Pontaix, again, a remarkable place, with a vaulted street and fortified houses overhanging the river, which here fills up the whole valley and leaves room only for the road and the narrow village-town, was the scene of an obstinate and murderous fight between the Marquis de Gordes on one side, and Lesdiguieres and Dupuy-Montbrun on the other, when the latter was captured, and shortly after beheaded at Grenoble.
The town of Die, _Dea Vocontiorum_, lies in a broad part of the valley.
It claims to be not _Dea Vocontiorum_ only, but also _Augusta Vocontiorum_, thereby apparently defrauding the village of Aouste, near Crest, of the earliest form of its name.