A native of the Southern Alps, Luc Moullet took note of the fact that cases of mental illness were particularly numerous in the region. Murder, dismemberment, suicide, immolation among his family, friends and the various "criminal affairs" of the last 100 years. Moullet studied the causes and consequences of these local psychic phenomena. "The great-grand-nephew of the great-grandfather of my great-great-grandmother one day took a pickax to the village mayor, his wife and the forester, who was guilty of having moved his goat 10 yards. It provided a good starting point...There were other manifestations of the same kind in the family."