The castle of Puilaurens
he castle of Puilaurens (in Occitan: Castèl de Puèglhaurenç) is an old fortified castle called "Cathar", now in ruins, the remains of which stand in the French town of Puilaurens in the department of Aude, in the Occitanie region.
The ruins of the castle are the subject of a classification as historical monuments by decree of the August 12, 1902.
Location
Historical
The origins
The castle is located on Mont Ardu. This name appears for the first time in 958 in a charter where Lothaire confirms the donation of Sunifred II of Cerdagne, lord of Fenouillèdes, to the Saint-Michel de Cuxa abbey of the provostship of Puilaurens which is made up of the valley of the Boulzane or Sainte-Croix valley. The document also mentions the presence of a Saint-Laurent church serving as a fortified and perched refuge from the Carolingian period.
The first known castellan of Puilaurens is Pierre Catala who appears as a witness in the acts of Guillaume de Peyrepertuse in 1217. In 1229, Guillaume de Peyrepertuse commands the castle of Puilaurens and, in 1242, it is held by Roger Catala, son of Pierre.
In addition to the castle, a village is built all around, which makes Puilaurens a castrum.
The Cathar presence
It is known only for the role of refuge of the castle during the crusade against the Albigensians. In 1242, the Cathar deacon of Fenouillèdes, Pierre Paraire stayed there. Several perfect and perfect will be accommodated there from 1245 to 1246. A certain Saurine Rigaud, resident of Fanjeaux and Cathar believer found refuge in Puilaurens in 1240 where she met twelve monks including eight women.
The annexation of the castle
Around 1250, the castle passed into the hands of the French crown. By a letter from August 1255, Louis IX ordered the seneschal of Carcassonne to fortify the castle. It is these works that inaugurate the appearance of the castle as we know it today. Saint Louis had it reinforced to defend Languedoc against Aragonese incursions. The Treaty of Corbeil of 1258 having made the castle one of the fortresses on the border of the kingdom facing Aragon.
It is then part of the "Five sons of Carcassonne" with the castles of Quéribus, Peyrepertuse, Termes and Aguilar, all located at the top of "impregnable" rocky peaks.
After the 1st campaign of works under Louis IX, it was occupief in 1260 by the largest garrison on the entire border, under the orders of a castellan, Odon de Monteuil, with a chaplain and 25 sergeants -at-arms. In 1263, "ten salted pigs, two bushels of wheat, six setiers of good flour" were delivered, as well as " two-footed crossbows, four in horn and two in wood, 4,100 crossbow bolts, eighteen shields, five helmets”.
Consolidation and fortification work continued under the leadership of Philippe le Bold from 1270 to 1285.
The castle will then resist several Aragonese attacks and will remain as the southernmost fortress in France. It resists two sieges but is taken in 1636 by default, half of the garrison is in Port Leucate and 800 Aragonese from Prades manage to seize it.
The abandonment of the castle
Like the other sons of Carcassonne, the castle of Puilaurens was gradually abandoned from the Treaty of the Pyrenees ratified in 1659 which fixed the Franco-Spanish border at the level of the Pyrenean crests. A weak garrison occupied the citadel for some time. Then, poorly defended and poorly maintained from the end of the 17th century, it was definitively abandoned during the Revolution.
Description
The castle of Puilaurens is composed of a backyard and a high court, plan inherited from the primitive castle. Its fortified enclosure follows the contour of the rocky base on which it is built.
Puilaurens castle is the archetype of the medieval military mountain citadel. The site presents all the defense systems invented between the 13th and 17th centuries, as weaponry evolved, from bows and crossbows to muskets and cannons, including catapults and trebuchets.
Access is to the south-west by a chicane ramp arranged in the fault of the rock and lined with nine walls thereafter. A parade ground, surrounded by walls pierced with embrasures also for firearms and forming a barbican protects the southern flank.
The castle itself is essentially made up of two adjoining enclosures. The first is organized around a courtyard, the second is a fortified room overlooking the first enclosure.
The front door leads to a small courtyard, which itself opens onto the courtyard whose irregular layout follows the contours of the rock. This main courtyard measures 60 × 25 meters. It is closed by curtain walls 8 to 10 meters high, uniting two semi-circular towers open to the gorge. It retained most of its crenellation. On the north front, a partially buried access serves a cistern and a room defended by two arrow slits. A postern (north) overlooks the remains of an outer cistern. At the foot of the east tower, a door gives access to a viewpoint outside the fortress. It dominates the villages of Puilaurens and Lapradelle with its viaduct. In the distance, you can see the Pic de Bugarach.
A footbridge now provides access to the second enclosure. The door of this enclosure is identical in proportion to that of the first enclosure. Opposite, a corridor between rock and curtain wall leads to the north tower, open to the gorge. On one side opens a narrow trench in the rock accessing galleries. They may have served as canneries. By taking stairs unearthed during works, one arrives at a tower of quadrangular plan (house-tower). Equipped with a fireplace and a cupboard, this habitable tower does not seem to date back beyond the 16th century.
To the west, carefully fitted curtain walls dominate the access baffles. They lead to a circular tower with boss whose room at ground level retains a vault of warheads and a duct speaking; it is called the Tower of the “White Lady”. This white lady would be none other than Blanche de Bourbon, grand-niece of Philippe le Bel who, before leaving for Spain to marry Pierre le Cruel, would have stayed at the Château de Puilaurens.
In this high enclosure, latrines and a cistern are visible. The observation of the different elevations composing this second enclosure seems to indicate a heterogeneous construction. The west and north towers, their adjacent curtain walls, the gate are indeed from the medieval period. The rest of the construction is from a more recent period.
It is now owned by the municipality. It can be visited from the end of March to mid-November. Guided tours are possible during this period.
It is currently the subject within the framework of a candidacy of a serial property, of a reflection to apply for UNESCO World Heritage to enhance the royal military architecture of defense adapting the Philippian model to mountain sites intended to control the Franco-Aragonese border. This serial property is included on the indicative list of the French State.
Restoration works
A first restoration campaign took place in the 1950s, thus making it possible to fill in particular two breaches opened above the entrance door to the first enclosure.
A restoration campaign was carried out between 1993 and 1996 in order to improve the reception of the public.
In 2019, a complete heritage diagnosis of the building was carried out with photographic surveys, 2D and 3D surveys and cleanliness in plans, sections and elevations. This diagnosis made it possible to define the various degrees of urgency encountered, both in terms of safeguarding the building and in terms of visitor safety.
Following the diagnosis, a call for tenders was launched and the first part of the work was able to begin in April 2021. The first part of the work aims to provide public safety at the level of the north postern with repairs to the east wall of the tank, securing the entrance to the tank, devegetation of the north postern. The work also made it possible to restore the south tower in its entirety with devegetation of the interior of the tower, restoration of the lintels, jamb of the niche with mantle at the top of the tower and repointing of the walls.
Geoportal.fr
"Ruins of the castle "[archive], on the open heritage platform, Mérimée base, French Ministry of Culture.
Bolòs i Masclans, Jordi, " Atles dels comtats de Rosselló, Conflent, Vallespir i Fenollet (759-991)" [archive] (ISBN 9788423207343, consulted on September 13, 2018).
Nicolas Mengus, Castles in the Middle Ages, Rennes, Ouest-France Editions, 2021, 283 p. (ISBN 978-2-7373-8461-5), p. 167.
See as well
Bibliography
In chronological order of publication.
Henri-Paul Eydoux, “Châteaux of the countries of the Aude”, in Archaeological Congress of France. 131st session. Aude country. 1973, French Archaeological Society, Paris, 1973, p. 190-196
Under the direction of Jean-Marie Pérouse de Montclos, The Languedoc Roussillon heritage guide, Hachette, Paris, 1996, p. 471-472, (ISBN 978-2-01-242333-6)
Lucien Bayrou, Languedoc-Roussillon Gothic: Military Architecture from Carcassonne to Perpignan, Paris, Picard, 2013, 288 p. (ISBN 978-2708409576, online presentation [archive]), p. 188-192
Lucien Bayrou, "Reconstruction and redevelopment of the castles that became royal in the Corbières after the Treaty of Corbeil (13th - 14th centuries)", in Patrimoines du Sud, 2019, no 10 (read online) [archive]
Lucien Bayrou, Royal Fortress of Puylaurens - Observations, remarks and reflections, CAIIMAN, December 2019.
Related articles
Cathar castles
List of castles in the Aude
List of historic monuments in Aude
Puilaurens
external links
Architecture Resource: deserved
Record in a general dictionary or encyclopedia: Gran Enciclopèdia Catalana [archive]
http://www.chateau-puilaurens.com [archive]
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