The fountain of Barenton

The fountain of Barenton summarizes the magic of Brocéliande perfectly: it is necessary, to find this fountain, to be inserted in the middle of the forest. It has heavy passed or history and legend are mèlent, it is said that its water is curative and that they have the capacity to cure the chronic diseases. It was a sanctuary for the Celtic religion. The druids had installed a school there and a hospital and celebrated there their worship dedicated to the solar god Bélénos, god of the lightning and the sources, large god healer. The name of the fountain in the feudal texts is besides Balenton, or Beleton, names which approach by consonnance the name the god.

     It is also said that it is there that Merlin will renconrtra Viviane for the first time, and that was born their love. It is there too that Chrétien of Troyes locates the action of its novel “the knight at the lion”.

It seems that the site was christianized after the departure of the druids, by the construction of a vault beside the fountain, the disappearance of this vault following the arrival in the area of a strange character, Eon of Star, with the XII ème century.

Finally Barenton is, since Chrétien of Troyes and by the novelists of the XVI ème century, the site where the water drawn with the fountain and poured on the stone called “the perron of Merlin”, starts in the hour the storm and the indescribable storms near to last cataclysm. The legend was transformed into popular belief, leading successive generations to go to processions to require the rain.