Menthon-Saint-Bernard Castle

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View of Menthon-Saint-Bernard Castle from the north

The castle Menthon-Saint-Bernard ( French Château de Menthon-Saint-Bernard ) is a castle in Menthon-Saint-Bernard in the French department of Haute-Savoie . It stands at a height of 600 meters above the village and Lake Annecy .

The complex belonged from the 13th to the 18th century and - after a short break in the 17th and 18th centuries - to this day of the influential noble family de Menthon , whose members were first masters and then barons before they were finally elevated to the rank of count . The castle has always been inhabited in the course of its history and has therefore always been well maintained. After redesigning it in the neo-Gothic style , the owner family opened the facility to visitors in 1903. It has been listed as a Monument Historique since February 21, 1989 .

history

The castle was first mentioned in a document in 1249 . At that time, the complex belonged to the Menthon family, who were first mentioned in writing as early as 1190 with Jean de Menthon. The castle was initially probably just a single wooden watchtower that stood where a Roman oppidum used to be. It was used to secure navigation on Lake Annecy and traffic on the former Roman road from Geneva to Italy . The fact that this place has very old roots is also borne out by the name "Menthon", which indicates a pre-Celtic origin and means "on the rock". In all probability, Bernhard von Menthon , who founded the hospice on the Great St. Bernhard , was born in this castle.

Illustration of the castle from before 1880

The wooden watchtower was replaced by a stone residential tower in the Middle Ages , which was soon followed by the arms tower ( French Tour des Armes ) and finally the sea ​​tower ( French Tour du Lac ). The lords of the castle had curtains connected to each other, the upper connection of which was formed by a battlement . From the Renaissance onwards , this was gradually replaced by residential buildings. From 1740 Bernard VI. de Menthon make the castle more modern and comfortable. Among other things, he built a residential building on the south side, called the lake facade ( French Façade du Lac ), which fills the space between the residential tower on the east side and the lake tower in the west. Bernard's daughter Françoise from his marriage to Marguerite de Lescheraine inherited the property and brought it to his family in 1746 by marrying Louis Veuillet de la Saulnière, Count of Domessin and Marquis of Yenne. Their children sold the castle at F. Ruphy, but in 1820 Balthazar Louis Bernard de Menthon bought the property back for his family. During the Second Empire , the Bishop of Orléans , Félix Dupanloup , was a frequent guest at Menthon-Saint-Bernard, so that one of the rooms in the complex is named after him today.

Balthazar's descendant René de Menthon had the castle redesigned from 1880 by the architects Charles Suisse, a student of Eugène Viollet-le-Duc , and Adolphe Prost in accordance with the prevailing trend of Romanticism in the neo-Gothic style. The castle took its present external appearance with small playful Tour Ellen and a half-timbered - gallery in the courtyard. The typically Savoyard aspect of the complex was lost. The current design of the representative rooms also dates from that time. Shortly after the work was finished, the castle owners opened the complex to visitors in 1903. Today it belongs to the brothers Pierre-Henri and Maurice de Menthon, nephews of the former French Minister of Economics, François de Menthon . They continue the tradition started by their ancestors and make nine rooms of the 105 castle rooms accessible to visitors. They can be viewed from May to September as part of paid guided tours. An average of 200 visitors take advantage of this offer every day. The castle owners also rent out rooms in the wine cellar and an outbuilding from the 17th century for parties and other events.

description

architecture

View of the castle from the southwest

The castle stands on a hill above the town of Menthon-Saint-Bernard and the Lac dʼAnnecy at an altitude of 600 meters. The facility is surrounded by a garden and park , its floor plan is given by the shape of the castle rock.

The silhouette of the complex is determined by its three large, medieval towers, which consist of a mixture of stones and mortar. At the highest point of the castle rock, on the northeast side, is the arms tower , which has an irregular, square floor plan and is flanked by a round stair tower . A little south of it stands the massive residential tower, which was the first building in the complex to be erected. On the west side there is another square tower called the sea ​​tower . With its 9 × 12 meter floor plan, it guards the entrance to the castle and the gate building with a wrought iron gate, which shows the coat of arms of the Lords of Counts. All three towers were connected to one another by curtains as early as the Middle Ages. Some parts of these walls date back to the 13th century - possibly even the 12th century. Several residential buildings are leaning against the inside, which together with the towers are grouped around a small inner courtyard.

inside rooms

Most of the interior design dates from the 18th and 19th centuries. There is also furniture and fixtures from the 15th to 17th centuries, including a tapestry and several Flemish tapestries .

An oratorio has been set up in what is believed to have been the room of St. Bernard . Legend has it that he fled from there in order not to comply with his father's wishes and to marry Marguerite de Miolans. With the castle chapel , another room commemorates the most famous son of the lord's family. It was previously consecrated to the Holy Veran and is guaranteed in writing for the year 1262. At that time it consisted only of what is now the lower part. In this area there is a wooden statue of Christ from the 15th century. At the end of the 19th century or 1907, René de Menthon had the now higher part added to the existing building in honor of Saint Bernard. The chapel is dedicated to him today. A reliquary , in which one of the saint's molars is kept, is one of the furnishings . The semi-domed vault of the choir is decorated with a fresco that shows, among other things, Bernhard fighting against evil.

In the Countess von Menthon's bedroom , which is also called Sälchen ( French sallette ), the architectural furnishings from the 15th to 16th centuries have been preserved. The beamed ceiling is even older, its painting dates from the 13th century. In the room you can see furniture from the 18th century from the workshop of the Grenoble cabinetmaker family Hache. 17th century tapestries from Aubusson hang on the walls . This type of wall hangings can also be found in the small salon , which has only been accessible to visitors to the castle since 2017.

The large salon in the lake facade (also called the music room ) was built - together with the dining room - in the 18th century and was redesigned in the neo-Gothic style under René de Menthon. The room has a monumental fireplace on the ledge of which the stone coat of arms of the Menthon family is emblazoned. Many portraits of family members hang on the walls, as well as a Venetian mirror from the 15th century and a tapestry from 1730, which the French King Louis XV. once gave to his minister of state Germain Louis Chauvelin . On the coffered ceiling you can see the coats of arms of those families who were married to the Menthons in the 19th century. The wedding chests , one of which dates back to the 15th century, are special furniture in this room .

The library is located in the lower part of the residential tower and was set up there in the mid-19th century. The foundation was laid by the library of the de Richardot de Choisey family from Dole , which came to his family through the marriage of Anne de Richardot de Choisey to Count Balthazar de Menthon in 1801. The library today contains around 12,000 works from the pre-revolutionary period, including manuscripts on parchment , incunabula from the second half of the 15th century and a book of hours from 1415. In addition to the numerous bookshelves, this room also has other wooden furnishings, such as the The coffered ceiling and the wooden paneling of the chimney vent, the fine carvings of which show stations from the life of St. Bernard.

A further room which can be seen in the castle, the so-called Pilgrim Hall ( French Salle des Pélerins ) of the first floor Seeturms is. It used to be the castle kitchen and also served as a guard room. Pilgrims who were on their way to Rome, Jerusalem or Santiago de Compostela could rest there. The furnishings, including the wooden beam ceiling, date from the 15th century. As a replacement for the medieval kitchen, a new kitchen area was created in the 19th century, which has a 15 meter long hatch carved into the rock.

literature

  • Nicholas Chaudun: Menthon. Bréviaire du Romantisme. In: vmf. Magazine du Patrimoine, de lʼArchitectur et des Jardins. No. 272, March 2017, ISSN  0049-6316 , pp. 16-21 ( PDF ; 2.4 MB).
  • Pierre Faucheux: Merveilles des châteaux de Savoie et du Dauphiné. Hachette, Paris 1972, ISBN 2-01-000465-5 , pp. 58-61.
  • Anne Gaël, Serge Girol: Châteaux et sites de la France médiévale. Hachette, Paris 1979, ISBN 2-01-005981-6 , p. 230.
  • Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. SAEP, Ingersheim 1992.
  • Charles-Laurent Salch: Atlas des châteaux forts en France. 19th edition. Publitotal, Strasbourg 1988, p. 709.

Web links

Commons : Burg Menthon-Saint-Bernard  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Entry of the castle in the Base Mérimée of the French Ministry of Culture (French)
  2. ↑ a b c d C.-L. Salch: Atlas des châteaux forts en France. 1988, p. 709.
  3. ↑ History of the castle on the official website ( Memento of the original from September 13, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Accessed September 9, 2017. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.chateau-de-menthon.com
  4. ^ A b Pierre Faucheux: Merveilles des châteaux de Savoie et du Dauphiné. 1972, p. 59.
  5. ^ Nicholas Chaudun: Menthon. Bréviaire du Romantisme. 2017, p. 19.
  6. ^ A b Jean de Foville, Auguste Le Sourd: Les châteaux de France. Hachette, Paris 1913, p. 352.
  7. ^ Colette Lanier: Des aménagements pour mieux accueillir les visiteurs au château de Menthon. In: Le Dauphiné Libéré. Edition of April 27, 2017, p. 5 ( digitized version ).
  8. ↑ a b Le château de Menthon-Saint-Bernard, une histoire de famille , accessed on September 11, 2017.
  9. ^ Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, p. 3.
  10. ^ A b Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, p. 14.
  11. ^ A b Nicholas Chaudun: Menthon. Bréviaire du Romantisme. 2017, p. 18.
  12. ^ Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, p. 28.
  13. ^ A b Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, p. 18.
  14. ^ Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, pp. 18, 20.
  15. ^ Sixte de Menthon: Le château de Menthon-St-Bernard. 1992, p. 31.
  16. ↑ Visitor information on the castle website ( Memento of the original from September 13, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Accessed September 13, 2017. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.chateau-de-menthon.com

Coordinates: 45 ° 51 ′ 50.1 ″  N , 6 ° 12 ′ 12.5 ″  E