 John Cassian established a priory at Saint-Baume in the early fifth century.According to the Tradition of Provence, Mary Magdalene, Lazare of Bethany, and Maximinus, one of the Seventy Disciples and some companions, expelled by persecutions from the Holy Land, traversed the Mediterranean in a frail boat with neither rudder nor mast and landed at the place called Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer near Arles.Lazarus came to Marseille and converted the whole of Provence.