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Bastide (planned town)Gironde

Bastide de Monségur

Monségur

Dimensions
The central square keeps its arcades and the ruets that serve the backs of the plots. In the middle stands the 19th-century market hall, outer galleries of 1866 and covered hall of 1897, a fine example of the marriage of cast iron and glass. The church of Notre-Dame, Gothic of the end of the 13th century, received in the 19th a neo-Gothic doorway, bell-tower and vault. The stair-tower known as the tour du Gouverneur, in Flamboyant style, and the wall-walk of one thousand eight hundred metres mark the line of the enclosure.
Period
Bastide founded in 1265; church of the end of the 13th century renovated in the 19th; tour du Gouverneur end of the 15th century; siege and massacre in 1562; metal market hall 1866-1897.
What stands there
Church of Notre-Dame inscribed as a monument historique in 1925, market hall and Passion cross of 1808 inscribed in 2011. The Esclapot, the municipal cartulary of the 14th century, preserves the charters of the commune from 1265. The commune is a member of the Fédération des Bastides d'Aquitaine; the market hall hosts the jazz festival Les 24 heures du Swing.

Perched on a ridge overlooking the valley of the Dropt, on the borders of the Gironde and the Lot-et-Garonne, Monségur lives up to its Gascon name of safe mount. The bastide was founded in 1265 by Eleanor of Provence, Queen of England, while her husband Henry III was a prisoner of the rebellious barons; its regular plan, adapted to the ridge line, is typical of the bastides of the years 1250-1270. The church of Notre-Dame was raised at the same time as the town, at the end of the 13th century. A wall-walk of one thousand eight hundred metres still girdles the bastide, the tower known as the tour du Gouverneur, of the end of the 15th century, guards its corner, and the arcaded square opens onto a market hall of cast iron and glass of the 19th century. Taken by storm by Blaise de Monluc during the Wars of Religion, Monségur keeps in its Esclapot the charters that made its liberty.

Further reading

Getting there : Village, square and wall-walk freely accessible. Weekly market on Friday and evening market on Wednesday evening from mid-June to mid-September, according to the Fédération des Bastides d'Aquitaine. Tourist office of the Entre-deux-Mers.

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 Monségur
Père Igor · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Nearby

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In the same department

All places — Gironde (23).