In 1214 Simon de Montfort attacked Beynac and its baron for being a devoted friend of the Cathar-friendly Count Raymond VI of Toulouse. Barons of Périgord, the Beynacs were every bit as daunting and fierce as their castle. One of most powerful castles in the region, Beynac looms 1115m over the Dordogne. Today you can explore the 12th-century Romanesque tower and Gothic keep and experience the renovation through the meticulously kept photographic records.Boasting classical French architecture, gorgeous gardens and stunning interiors, Dordogne’s châteaux are like something from a fairytale. The castle was rediscovered in the 1970s and bought by Hubert de Commarque, a descendent of the original builders. The ambitious Beynac family took control of it and expanded it from a wooden tower to the stone keep that stands today.ĭuring the Hundred Years’ War and the French Wars of Religion, it changed hands several times and was abandoned in the 18th century. Originally it was just a wooden tower built to protect two important trade routes in the region: the road from Périgueux to Cahors and that from Brive to Bergerac.
This fortified castle was built during the 12th century at the intersection of two important commercial roads. It’s in the commune of Les Eyzies-de-Tayac-Sireuil and is one of the most interesting castles in the Dordogne Valley. The Château de Commarque looms on a hillside above the valley of the river La Beune in the Vézère Valley.
It also has lovely apartments with their original woodwork and painted ceilings, a Renaissance fireplace, and 15th-century frescos.Ĭhateau de Beynac was bought by Lucien Grosso in 1962 and several movies have been shot there including Chocolat and Jeanne d’Arc. The oldest part of the castle, the keep, is in a Romanesque style, but the castle boasts later additions like a 14th-century residence and 17th-century apartments. Not far from there, on the other side of the Dordogne Rival, Château de Castelnaud was in the hands of the English. The two castles have been eternal rivals throughout the ages.Ĭhâteau de Beynac was built in the 12th century by the Barons of Beynac and over the years has seen many illustrious defenders, including King Richard I and Simon de Montfort, leader of one of the Albigensian Crusades.Īt the time of the Hundred Years War, Château Beynac was one of the strongholds of France. It’s located in the commune of Beynac-et-Cazenac, one of the prettiest villages in all of France, and is on the other side of the Dordogne River, facing Château de Castelnaud. This is one of the best-preserved and well-known Chateaux in Dordogne. Today, the Castles in the Dordogne are still the guardians of the Dordogne and Vézère Rivers and they are silent witnesses of a turbulent chapter of France’s history. The centuries that followed transformed the architecture and appearance of the fortresses, which grew more open and took on more windows. On the French side, the Château de Beynac faced off with the Château de Castelnaud, then in British possession… The Dordogne River was the symbolic frontier between the two enemy kingdoms. To best understand its history, you have to go back to 1337, when Eleanor of Aquitaine married the heir to the English throne and gave part of the Périgord to the English. It was the Hundred Years’ War that most marked this region. In the 13th century, the Dordogne was an area of major conflict between France and England.
In the 10th – 11th centuries, the Dordogne Castles were established on naturally strong points, rocky escarpments, spur points, almost always near land or river communications axes to control them and impose a toll. Castles in the Dordogne Department – Historical Background
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