Hauts LieuxChapels, sanctuaries & legends

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Legendary castleDordogne

Château de Belcayre

Thonac

Dimensions
A main residential range running east–west, trapezoidal in plan, over a ground floor, one full storey and a parapet level, served by a circular stair tower projecting from the wall; a second residential range to the west. Door frames with chamfered surrounds and moulded windows of the beginning of the 16th century. Terraces built, as the tourist office puts it, "like the prows of a ship" above the Vézère. A wall-walk and an entrance pavilion added around 1905, roofs re-laid in slate.
Period
First mention in 1361 (homage of Johannes de Belcayre to the count of Périgord); present residential range of the beginning of the 16th century, around 1500–1510; restorations around 1905.
What stands there
Not protected as a monument historique. Private property. Successive families: Belcayre, Reilhac in the 16th century, Calvimont in the 17th, Cézac in the 18th, Mazel in the 19th.

Belcayre holds a spur above the Vézère, at the point where three parishes met. Johannes de Belcayre did homage for his land to the count of Périgord in 1361; the position then served to watch the traffic of the river. The residential range visible today dates from the beginning of the 16th century, recognisable by its chamfered doorways and its moulded windows. In the spring of 1592, during the Wars of Religion, the sieur de Beynac had the house of Belcayre-sur-Vézère blown open by night with petards. The castle then declined, changed hands several times, and received around 1905 a restoration that gave it its wall-walk and its entrance pavilion.

Further reading

Getting there : Private property, not open to visitors; visible from outside only, from the road of the Vézère valley.

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

See it on the map OpenStreetMap Directions

Ambient sound

Château de Belcayre
Père Igor · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Nearby

In the same department

All places — Dordogne (80).