The Provençal historians state that Les Martigues did not exist as such until the middle of the thirteenth century, and that up to that time it consisted merely of a few families of fisherfolk living in huts upon the ruins of a former settlement, which may have been Roman, or perhaps Greek. This first settlement was on the Ile St. Geniez, which now forms the official quarter of the triple town. Martigues is all but indescribable, its three _quartiers_ are so widely diversified in interest and each so characteristic in the life which goes on within its confines,--Jonquières, with its shady Cours and narrow cobblestoned streets; the Ile, surrounded by its canals and fishing-boats, and Ferrières, a more or less fastidious faubourg backed up against the hillside, crowned by an old Capucin convent. For a matter of fifteen hundred years there has been communication between the Étang de Berre and the Mediterranean, and the Martigaux have ever been alive to keeping the channel open. Through this canal the fish which give industry and prosperity to Martigues make their way with an almost inexplicable regularity. A migration takes place from the Mediterranean to the Étang from February to July, and from July to February they pass in the opposite direction. Their capture in deep water is difficult, and the Martigaux have ingeniously built narrow waterways ending in a cul-de-sac, through which the fish must naturally pass on their passage between the Étang and the sea. The taking of the fish under such conditions is a sort of automatic process, so efficacious and simple that it would seem as though the plan might be tried elsewhere. The name given to the sluices or fish thoroughfares is _bourdigues_, and the fishermen are known as _bourdigaliers_, a title which is not known or recognized elsewhere. The _bourdigue_ fishery is a monopoly, however, and many have been the attempts to break down the “vested interests” of the proprietors. Originally these rights belonged to the Archbishop of Arles, and later to the Seigneurs de Gallifet, Princes of Martigues, when the town was made a principality by Henri IV. It has continued to be a private enterprise unto to-day, and has been sanctioned by the courts, so there appears no immediate probability of the general populace of Martigues being able to participate in it.