Chateau De Fayrac BY DRONE! Wonderful!!! – Périgord France – ECTV

Chateau De Fayrac BY DRONE! Wonderful!!! – Périgord France – ECTV

The Château de Fayrac is a French residence of the fifteenth, sixteenth and nineteenthcenturies[1] built on the banks of the Dordogne, in the commune of Castelnaud-la-Chapelle, in the Dordogne department, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region.

History
The name of Fayrac appears in an inventory of church property in the thirteenth century. It was then a modest fortified house which left only vaulted cellars and a round tower in the current castle. The name was then written Afayrac or Affeyrac.

In the fourteenth century, the castle belonged to the lords of Castelnaud, the Caumont family. It was then called the “Fayrac towers”. In 1342, Raoul de Caumont, brother of Bertrand de Caumont, gave it as a dowry to his daughter. During the Hundred Years’ War, the towers of Fayrac served as a lookout for the castle of Castelnaud, which held for the king of England, opposite the castle of Beynac which supported the king of France.

At the end of the war, the castle passed to Léonard de Prouhet in 1459. This was the varlet[N 1] of the Count of Périgord, Jean de Châtillon dit de Bretagne. The Count, wishing to reward him for his valour, gave him the “gift of land at the Treille d’Affeyrac”, and he married the heiress of the castle. An entrance castle with drawbridge giving access to the inner courtyard dates from the fifteenth century.

In the chronicles of Canon Tarde, we find in 1529 a Raymond de Prouhet, lord of Fayrac, lieutenant-general of the seneschal’s court of Sarlat. It was probably at this time that the entrance castle and the castle were embellished and a dwelling was added in a style reminiscent of Italian Renaissance architecture, perhaps under the influence of the contemporary Bishop of Sarlat, Nicolas Gaddi.

The heiress of the castle married Jean de Blanchier, or Blancher, advisor to the Presidial of Sarlat, passing the castle to this family. Two sons were born of this union, Jean de Blancher, lord of Fayrac, and Pierre who made a career in the magistracy and was a councillor in the parliament of Bordeaux in 1578[2]. John became a Protestant and Peter remained a Catholic. During the Wars of Religion, Fayrac was then one of the castles held by the Protestants or Religionists, along with Castelnaud, Beynac, Domme, Les Milandes, Saint-Cyprien, La Serre, Campaignac, Salignac, Paluel, La Garrigue and Montfort. John fought on the Protestant side and Pierre was killed by the Religionists “on the night of Saturday, the sixteenth of September 1580” according to a chronicle by a canon of Sireuil. Shortly afterwards, Jean de Blancher married Simone de Vivans, daughter of Geoffroy de Vivans, captain of the castle of Castelnaud. After the capture of Domme, Geoffroy de Vivans entrusted the custody of the town to his son-in-law.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century, we find a Jean de Blancher registered on the ban of the nobility of Périgord, as lord of Fayrac. A little later, Blancher’s name is found in the records of a trial.

In 1789, the castle was owned by a collateral branch, some of whose members had emigrated. The castle was then seized as national property and sold. It was bought by a lawyer from Sarlat named Gayraud who became rich by speculating on assignats. He restored the castle.

In the nineteenth century, the castle was the property of the composer Fernand Fouant de La Tombelle[3], one of the founders of the Schola Cantorum, who extensively restored it.

André Malraux stayed at the castle for a few weeks when he joined the Resistance following the arrest of his brothers, after March 1944[4].

Like its illustrious neighbours, Beynac, Castelnaud, Lacoste, Marqueyssac and Les Milandes, it is part of the tourist complex known as the “Valley of the Six Castles”.

The castle has been listed as a historical monument since 31 March 1928[1].

It is privately owned and not open to the public.

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