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Bastide (planned town)Gironde

Bastide de Blasimon

Blasimon

Dimensions
The central square, square in plan, keeps part of its arcades of the 14th and 15th centuries and a town hall of the 17th; the streets leading from it cross at right angles. Below, the former abbey church of Saint-Maurice, now the church of Saint-Nicolas, presents a Romanesque façade with a carved doorway, a 16th-century bell-gable, ruins of a cloister and a fortification tower. In the surroundings, the fortified mills of Labarthe and La Borie, a menhir and the dolmen of La Mouleyre complete the picture.
Period
Abbey attested in 980, church of the 11th to 13th centuries; bastide founded about 1317-1322; covered arcades of the 14th and 15th centuries; abbey besieged in 1587, dismantled from 1778.
What stands there
Abbey of Saint-Maurice classified as a monument historique in 1925, church of Saint-Nicolas classified by the list of 1875, bell of 1622 classified in 1942, mill of Labarthe classified in 1926. The commune is a member of the Fédération des Bastides d'Aquitaine and of the Union des villes bastides de Gironde; about 924 inhabitants according to the Fédération.

In the hills of the Entre-deux-Mers, some twenty kilometres south-east of Libourne, Blasimon combines a thousand-year-old Benedictine abbey and a small English bastide. The abbey of Saint-Maurice, attested from 980, held granges and mills in the valley of the Gamage when, about 1317-1322, a seneschal of the King of England Edward II concluded with Abbot Martin a paréage to establish a new town beside the castle, attested since 1255. The charter was modelled on that of Sauveterre-de-Guyenne and close to a thousand plots were planned around a square of about fifty metres. The bastide remained modest, but its square has kept part of its covered arcades of the 14th and 15th centuries, its streets still cross at right angles, and the abbey church offers one of the finest Romanesque doorways in the Gironde.

Further reading

Getting there : Village and surroundings of the abbey freely accessible. The Fédération des Bastides d'Aquitaine reports regular markets and seasonal events.

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

Bastide de Blasimon
Henry Salomé · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Nearby

In the same department

All places — Gironde (23).