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Bastide (planned town)Lot-et-Garonne

Bastide de Caudecoste

Caudecoste

Dimensions
The grid of the bastide, enclosed within a semicircular outline, is ordered around the place des Cornières and its covered passages, 56 metres long by 60. Many timber-framed houses, rebuilt after the siege of 1651, line the streets. Remains of the wall, more than a metre thick and four metres high, are still visible. The Maison des Consuls houses a museum; the church of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine and the châteaux of Nazelles and of Beaujardin complete the visit.
Period
Neolithic and Gallo-Roman occupation; village attested about 900; community recognised by Urban II in 1096; flood of 1270; charter of 1273 and building until 1300; pillaging of 1585; siege of 1651; enclosure dismantled in 1791.
What stands there
A bastide belonging to the Fédération des Bastides d'Aquitaine, presented as a rare bastide founded directly by a religious order without a paréage. The château de Nazelles has been inscribed as a monument historique since 1997. The town hall keeps a chalice of 1515-1530 given by the prince de Conti in regret for the siege of 1651.

South of Agen, Caudecoste owes its name and its site to a disaster: about 1270 a flood of the Garonne devastated the village on the banks of the river, whose history went back to the Gallo-Romans, and the inhabitants withdrew to the neighbouring promontory, the Costo Caudo. The charter of customs of 1273 made this refuge a bastide, a rare case of a new town founded directly by a religious order without a paréage with a prince, the village having depended on Layrac and on Cluny since the 10th century. The grid plan is set within a semicircular outline imposed by the relief; the place des Cornières, with its covered passages, and many timber-framed houses give the village its character. Pillaged in 1585, besieged and ravaged in 1651 by the prince de Conti, who later offered a chalice as a sign of regret, Caudecoste rebuilt its houses after the fire and keeps stretches of its wall.

Further reading

Getting there : Free access to the village. Museum in the Maison des Consuls; no opening times or market documented in the texts.

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 Caudecoste
WCOMFR Mireille GRUMBERG · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

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In the same department

All places — Lot-et-Garonne (34).