Château du Rosemont

Riervescemont

On a rocky pinnacle ringed by sheer drops, at the head of the upper Rosemontoise valley, a few stretches of wall tell of the vanished power of Rosemont. The fortress was raised in the 11th century on the initiative of Louis de Mousson, Count of Montbéliard, whose family also held the great Lorraine hill of Mousson: from up here, its castellans controlled a lordship covering a good part of the present-day Territoire de Belfort, between the Vosges and the Belfort Gap. Passing in 1321, by marriage, to the Margraves of Baden, then in 1333 to the House of Austria, the lordship long kept its weight: the "coutumier du Rosemont" (the Rosemont customary) laid down the rules of justice for the county, which retained its high jurisdiction — and its gibbet — alongside the courts of Belfort and Ferrette. Abandoned as a residence before 1469, the castle still served as a refuge when the Thirty Years' War caught up with it: Swedish troops took and ruined it around 1632–1633, in the autumn of a campaign that devastated the whole region. All that survives is a heap of stones and the remains of the square keep, which vegetation and rockfalls nibble away year by year; the title of Count of Rosemont has passed, by inheritance, to the Grimaldi family of Monaco. The site, wild and vertiginous, has to be earned: it is approached from the south as far as the ditch cut into the rock, with due respect for the fragility of the remains.

Getting there : From the village of Riervescemont, a path leads up to the pinnacle; approach from the south only, as far as the ditch cut into the rock; the ruins are dangerous (sheer drops on three sides) and should be admired from a distance

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound