Towers to visit France

Impossible to miss: The fripon is in front of the church, slowing down the Thouet. Composed of five arches, whose three médianes are in full hanger and the other two broken arch, it was built in the th century. According to everyone, it is one of the most beautiful bridges in the Thouet, which is still lacking. Beyond the Thouet is a colombier, reporting the site of a former seigneury.

The so-called Prince of Wales tower was built at the end of the th century. This building is part of the fortifications around the city, it also served as a door, a garrison housing and a grain warehouse. From the th century, this tower became a prison where faux, smugglers of salt were imprisoned. At this time, gabelle (salt tax) varies according to provinces (ten times cheaper from one region to another) involving significant traffic. In 1994, artists Angel Leccia and Jacques Old invested this place by performing two works of art. These enduring works, while testifying to current artistic practices, are a new challenge to the already long memory of this heritage. Angel Leccia's video installation has its place inside the wooden prisons in which the captives of the tower were once locked.

Built at the end of the 11th century to defend the Risle valley, the Brionne keep is one of the rare square Norman keeps still standing today. Note the thickness of its walls, nearly 4 meters, and admire the remains of the bays and a chimney, the latter being as if suspended in the void! Dismantled in the 18th century by the lords of Brionne, this building marks the landscape with its power and remains the flagship symbol of the town despite its minor role during the Hundred Years War. From the heights, the panoramic view is superb.

Image of the village, it is the only remaining part of the entrance of the fortifications built in the th and th centuries.

Contact the Chevallier-Debeausse Foundation for permission to enter the property. With entry, it is the only remaining remnant of the feudal castle. It is a circular dungeon well characterized by its defensive aspect. But we could also live there, witness inner rooms arched on warheads that include chimneys and windows. The chapel Saint-Nicolas of the castle and the church Notre-Dame were covered with frescoes under the impetus of Florimond Robertet, Treasurer of France and Secretary of Finance under François I, when he bought the castle in 1505 and began to restore it. In the chapel next to the dungeon, open virgin wood and series of frescoes whose mystery and meaning remains to be overcome.

In Saint-Maximin, a thirty-three meter tower erected in 1895 on the ruins of an old medieval castle, by the Carthusian monks in honor of Saint Hugues d'Avalon, Carthusian and bishop of Lincoln at the end of the ^12th century, where documents on ancient rural life are presented. Exhibition of paintings and sculptures. Visit to the chapel of the Tower of Avalon. Panoramic view on the Grésivaudan valley from the top.

Located in the immediate vicinity of Saint-Caprais cathedral, this tower classified as Historic Monument, is the last vestige of the second enclosure of Agen. In the Middle Ages, the city was protected by an important fortification system and if the tower has survived, it is because it has been the bell tower of the Benedictines convent for a long time. The convent was liquidated after the French Revolution and this tower was used as a jail from 1815. Long neglected, it has been restored and now houses an architectural firm.