Jim Marrs - Rule by Secrecy - The Hidden History that Connects the Trilateral Commission, the Freema

In 1891, while working in the church, Sauniere removed the alter stone and discovered that one of its supports was hollow and contained four parchment documents—two genealogies dating from 1244 and 1644 along with two missives written in the 1780s by a former parish priest, Abbot Antoine Bigou.

The Bigou texts were unusual and appeared to be written in different codes. "Some of them are fantastically complex, defying even a computer, and insoluble without the requisite key," stated Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln.

Sauniere took his discovery to his superior the bishop of nearby Carcassonne, who sent him on to Paris to meet with the director general of the Saint Sulpice Seminary. Later it was found that in earlier years, this seminary had been the center for an unorthodox society called the Compagnie du Saint-Sacrement, thought to be a front for the Priory of Sion. If this was the case, it would explain how Priory members learned of Sauniere's discovery.

Whatever was in the documents, it set Sauniere's life on an entirely new course. "For during his short stay in Paris, Sauniere began to mix with the city's cultural elite, many of whom had dabbled in the occult arts," noted authors Vankin and Whalen. "Contemporary gossip had it that the country priest had an affair with Emma Calve, the famous opera diva who was also the high priestess of the Parisian esoteric underground. She would later visit him frequently in Rennes-le-Chateau."

Not only did Sauniere's reported Paris visit gain him new friends in high places, he also came into great wealth. Before his sudden death in 1917, researchers estimated he had spent several million dollars on construction and renovations in the town. During his work upon returning from Paris, Sauniere made yet another discovery—a small crypt beneath the church reportedly containing skeletons.

His behavior became quite odd. Sauniere scraped off a Latin inscription on the headstone of a member of the prominent local Blanchefort family, not realizing that copies had already been made. Translated, the inscription read, "To Dagobert II King and to Sion belongs this treasure and he is there dead." He began collecting worthless postage stamps and valueless rocks along with costly rare china and fabrics.

But he also had the town's toad and water supply upgraded, assembled a massive library, and built a zoological garden, a lavish country house named Villa Bethania and a round tower named Tour Magdala