This is a strange, eerie place. Manoir de la Saucerie (Commune de la Haute Chapelle) near Domfront in the Orne. It a castle gatehouse without the castle. There is even a part-moat — a pond and a bridge over it that may have once been a drawbridge. There are slits for the chains.
It stands in a corner of a flat marshy plain. There are a few houses nearby and cows graze in the fields but otherwise the place looks as though it's deserted.
The manor dates from the late 12th century when there was a trend for knights to move out of the small houses they had previously occupied within the bailey to live in fortified houses in the countryside. Aliénor (Eleanor) of Aquitaine, queen of both England and France, gave the land to one of her knights, Robert Le Saucier. Why he left us only this beautiful (recently restored) gatehouse, I don't know. Perhaps there was a palisade. There was also a manor house nearby, it burned down in 19th Century.
No comments:
Post a Comment