Maison forte d’Agencourt

History

Records call the site a house in 1320, a château in 1422, a fortified house in 1424 and a fortress in 1433 and 1470, with drawbridge, moats and towers. In the 15th century the lordship belonged to the Vichy family, then to the Saint-Martin d'Agencourt family, who kept it until 1705. By 1539 it was simply a lord's residence, and in the 17th century it served as a hunting lodge.

The buildings were largely rebuilt around 1650, and the vaulted stables date from 1643. In the 19th century a novitiate of the Sisters of Saint Joseph moved in. In 1947 Abbé Bart founded a maison familiale rurale here to train young women from farming families. The school became mixed in 1993, and major works in the 2000s cleared the moats and restored the old buildings.

Architecture

Little remains of the medieval stronghold: part of the moats, a large round tower whose domed cellar has three gun loops, and a coat of arms dated 1607 reused in a gable. The platform is reached by a two-arched stone bridge over a moat fed by a spring. The listed stables of 1643 have round-arched vaults resting on about twenty slender columns.