Ansouis Castle

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Ansouis Castle above the village of the same name

The Ansouis Castle ( French Château d'Ansouis ) stands on a rock in the Valley of Eygues in the heart of Provence to the French village of Ansouis . The palace complex goes back to a medieval castle that has been expanded and changed over the centuries. In the 17th and 18th centuries, it was transformed into a homely residence for the de Sabran family. It has been under monument protection since May 10, 1948 as a classified Monument historique. Parts of the castle can be viewed from April to October as part of a guided tour, which around 15,000 visitors make use of every year.

description

Southern gateway

The castle is a square complex with corner towers from the 11th / 12th centuries. Century and a fortified access portal on the south side. Its appearance is the result of rebuilding after damage, extensions and changes in different art historical epochs. The four floors of the castle are spread over different levels of the rock on which the facility stands. The shape of the building is based on the shape of the rock in many places. The exterior of the castle is strikingly simple and thus typical of the feudal architecture of the Midi . In addition to palace gardens and a palace park, the property owns 11.8  hectares of land.

The core of today's castle is a square residential tower that was surrounded by various buildings in the High Middle Ages . The tower still dominates the entire castle today. After the visitor has crossed the southern gate with his machinists , he reaches an esplanade in front of the main building via a long staircase , on the west side of which are the former farm buildings of the castle. Its classicist façade on the south side shows many large windows with blown gables , while the north facade makes a repellent, defensive impression. Entry into the castle building is provided by a rough portal above which there is a niche with a baluster parapet . Above it is the stone coat of arms of the de Sabran family.

Main portal

Behind the portal is a narrow entrance area with a long staircase. Like the coffered ceiling of the room, this dates from the Renaissance period . The more than 50 rooms of the castle occupy an area of ​​about 1800 m². Some of these may be visited, including the medieval kitchen with its barrel vault and large fireplace, which keep and the rooms of St. Elzéars ( French salle Saint Elzéar ), all of which date from the Middle Ages. The former hall of the guards ( French salle de gardes ), which has been rededicated as the castle chapel, can also be visited. Its multi-colored marble altar was a gift from the French King Louis XV.

Furthermore, some residential apartments, salons , dining rooms and the coat of arms hall ( French salle d'armes ) with marble floors can be visited. In some living areas, the lavish plaster decorations in rocaille shapes on the walls are of art-historical significance .

The approximately 4.8 hectare gardens and parks are also open to visitors to the palace. You can see, among other things, five terraced parterres from 1756 , some of which are planted with box trees cut into shape, as well as a flower garden and a bosquet . Some parts of the palace gardens were designed by Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc in the 17th century . The park consists mostly of tree-lined lawns, but also has an avenue of cypress trees over 220 meters long and a 42 × 11 meter, two meter deep water basin, which is one of a series of water features from the 18th century.

history

A castle in Ansouis was first mentioned in writing as Castrum quae dicitur Ansoyse in a document from 960 issued by Boso II , Count of Provence. At that time it was owned by the Counts of Forcalquier and consisted only of a stone tower block. Excavation finds showed, however, that a fortification existed at this place as early as Roman times , which was called castrum de Ansoissis . A four-kilometer-long water pipe from that time has been preserved and still supplies the castle with water today. Through the marriage of Garsindes, the heir to Guillaume IV. De Forcalquier, with Raymond I de Sabran, the castle came to the groom's family in 1178. The couple's daughter married Alfonso II , Count of Provence, and was the grandmother of Margaret , Eleonore , Sancha and Beatrix of Provence , who all married kings. The de Sabran family was related to many European royal families through these four women.

The south facade of the castle is the result of redesigns in the 17th and 18th centuries

In the course of the 11th / 12th, 13th and 15th centuries, the lords of the castle expanded their complex with additional buildings, with which they surrounded the residential tower, so that the castle finally had a square floor plan and was secured at all corners by defensive towers . Elzéar von Sabran was born there in 1285 and was married to Delphine de Puy-Michel in 1299 at a young age . The pious couple vowed eternal chastity and performed many good deeds and miracles in the neighborhood, so Elzéar 1371 Saints and his wife beatified was. Destroyed by the Grandes Compagnies in 1358 , the castle was then rebuilt.

During the French wars of religion in the 16th century, the complex was alternately in the hands of Huguenots and Catholics. 1574 was of Huguenots from Ménerbes ingested, 1585 occupied them soldiers under the command of Gaspard guard, Baron of Vins. The armed conflicts were accompanied by severe damage, so that the de Sabran family had the medieval castle replaced by a new one. This was completely softened in the 17th and 18th centuries and redesigned into a luxurious complex in the classicist Baroque style. However, it was only the second residence of the owners, because a large part of the family was in the service of the French king and stayed at his court in Versailles . During the French Revolution , the then lady of the castle, the Salonnière Françoise Eléonore Dejean de Manville , widow of Jean de Sabran, emigrated . Confiscated and then sold to a Ricard family, their property later came to the Marquise de Saqui de Sannes, from whom Elzéar Louis Zozime de Sabran bought it back in 1836 for his family.

The castle remained uninhabited for almost the entire 19th century, and it was not until 1936 that Foulques de Sabran-Pontevès and his wife Roselyne, née Manca-Amat de Vallambrosa, used it again as their permanent residence. The couple spent the next 40 years or so gradually restoring the dilapidated facility and making it open to the public for tours. After the mistress of the castle died in 1988, a long-standing dispute over the inheritance broke out among the four children without any amicable agreement. The dispute culminated in late 2007 / early 2008 in a court-ordered public auction of the entire family property, including Ansouis Castle. The couple Gérard and Frédérique Rousset-Ruvière from Marseille , who paid 5.6 million euros for the property, were awarded the contract. After three years of restoration and repair work, the new owners also opened the castle for tours.

literature

  • Raoul Bérenguier: Le château dʼAnsouis. Nouvelles Éditions Latines, Paris undated
  • Thorsten Droste: Dauphiné and Haute-Provence. Discovery trips between the Rhône and the Alps, from Lyon to the Verdon Gorge. DuMont, Cologne 1992, ISBN 3-7701-2408-1 , pp. 279-280.
  • Claude Frégnac (Ed.): Merveilles des châteaux de Provence. Hachette, Paris 1965, pp. 116-123.
  • Martine Freynet, Maxime Aussel: Noël en Provence: visite privée du château d'Ansouis. In: Elle Maison. November 2011 ( online ).
  • Ernest de Ganay: Châteaux de France. Regional Center and South. Tel, Paris 1950, pp. 9-10.
  • Marie Isabelle de Sabran: La Folie du château d'Ansouis. Une demeure, un jardin secret en Provence. Spiralinthe, Semur-en-Auxois 2007.
  • Robert Schezen, Laure Murat: Castles and country manors in France. Heyne, Munich 1991, ISBN 3-453-05185-8 , pp. 368, 372.

Web links

Commons : Ansouis Castle  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Entry of the castle in the Base Mérimée of the French Ministry of Culture (French)
  2. ↑ a b Gylaine Idoux, Claude Almodovar: Qui sera le seigneur d'Ansouis? . In: Le Journal du Dimanche. Edition July 8, 2007.
  3. ↑ a b c R. Schezen, L. Murat: Castles and country seats in France. 1991, p. 368.
  4. ^ T. Droste: Dauphiné and Haute-Provence. 1992, p. 280.
  5. ↑ a b c Bruno Amigues: Le château d'Ansouis. PDF with information about the lock on the occasion of its sale in 2007/2008, p. 1 ( PDF ; 1.7 MB).
  6. ↑ Gérard Denizeau: Châteaux. 2nd Edition. Larousse, Paris 2008, ISBN 978-2-03-583965-7 , p. 255.
  7. ^ R. Bérenguier: Le château dʼAnsouis. no year, p. 30.
  8. ^ A b E. de Ganay: Châteaux de France. Regional Center and South. 1950, p. 10.
  9. ^ R. Bérenguier: Le château dʼAnsouis. n.d., p. 18.
  10. ↑ Information according to the online cadastral map for Ansouis on geoportail.gouv.fr
  11. ↑ a b Bruno Amigues: Le château d'Ansouis. PDF with information about the lock on the occasion of its sale in 2007/2008, p. 11 ( PDF ; 1.7 MB).
  12. ↑ a b Bruno Amigues: Le château d'Ansouis. PDF with information about the lock on the occasion of its sale in 2007/2008, p. 3 ( PDF ; 1.7 MB).
  13. ↑ a b R. Bérenguier: Le château dʼAnsouis. no year, p. 6.
  14. ↑ Bruno Amigues: Le chateau d'Ansouis. PDF with information about the castle on the occasion of its sale in 2007/2008, pp. 3–4 ( PDF ; 1.7 MB).
  15. ↑ C. Frégnac: Merveilles des châteaux de Provence. 1965, p. 123.
  16. ^ T. Droste: Dauphiné and Haute-Provence. 1992, p. 279.
  17. ^ R. Bérenguier: Le château dʼAnsouis. no year, p. 19.
  18. ^ E. de Ganay: Châteaux de France. Regional Center and South. 1950, p. 9.
  19. ↑ a b Ansouis Castle on passionchateaux.com ( Memento from May 31, 2019 in the Internet Archive )
  20. ↑ Bruno Amigues: Le chateau d'Ansouis. PDF with information about the lock on the occasion of its sale in 2007/2008, p. 12 ( PDF ; 1.7 MB).
  21. ↑ Un château trop away! In: Le Point . Online edition of August 12, 2010 ( online ).

Coordinates: 43 ° 44 ′ 20 "  N , 5 ° 27 ′ 50"  E