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The Hortus mountain (512 meters) is located on the municipality/on the territory of the town of Valflaunès (Hérault), about 20 kilometers north of Montpellier, near the mountain of Pic Saint-Loup, which it faces. It is constituted by the fracture of the plateau of Pompignan.

Its impressive and very appealing white Limestone cliff, 100 meters high and 1 kilometre long, is visible from all of Montpellier’s region. It shelters some couple of raptors.

With its neighbour the Pic Saint Loup, the Hortus constitute one of the most privileged hiking spots for the habitants of Montpellier.

The Hortus constitute the southern rim of a small cause (limestone plateau) including the following towns: Rouet, Claret and Notre-Dame-de-Londres.

Geology
Cretaceous limestone cliff liberated by diaclase and collapse of the plateau of Pompignan (patus) between the Hortus and the Pic Saint Loup.

The Hortus cave: a Neanderthal shelter
The Hortus cave provided shelter to the Neanderthal man, between 60 000 and 30 000 years ago. The search of its porch, made on a large pit, delivered a stratigraphy of a few meters. This search, led by a multidisciplinary team, provided information on the climate, on the fauna and the contemporary flora of the men who left on the site an abundant Mousterian industry (tips, blades, scrapers ...) as well as bones from their fellow being (a hundred pieces, including many maxillae and mandibles).

After this first occupation, the stratigraphy does not deliver material from the upper Paleolithic. Nevertheless, tracks were found of a regular occupation from Neolithic (Chassean and Ferrires) to Chalcolithic and the final bronze age.



A jewel of rock climbing
Thanks to its vertical position, the Hortus limestone has become a major rock-climbing point in Languedoc-Roussillon. Sixty beautiful ways runs across the cliff, offering a rock climbing more pleasant and more difficult (sixth to eighth degree) than the North face of Pic Saint Loup, neighbouring.

Viticulture
On the hillsides of the Hortus and the Pic Saint Loup, lies the well-known vineyards which delivers the vintages Pic Saint Loup (Designation of origin controlled since January 2017).