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 LANGEAIS
doesn’t seem to be very impressed by its severe and
haughty, even arrogant and grim chateau, but after all, it was built for that!
The small city is animated, rather sympathetic.
Just pay the TOURIST OFFICE a visit, place du 14-Juillet tel 0247965822, next to
town hall. They'll give you a good documentation, pedestrian and bicycle
itineraries.
You can rent bikes at STATION TOURAINE, 24 rue de Tours tel 0247968117
This chateau is in any case a maverick. Exceptional because located in the
middle of the city. No mirroring castle ditches, no murmuring brooks but two
impressive towers with machicolation, with in between a, ok 19th
century but medieval modelled drawbridge, suddenly pop up at the end of an
asphalted shopping street. What is also rare is that Langeais was built in a
quick tempo (1465-1469) and left intact since.
No added Renaissance wings or Italian decorations but just a solid feudal
castle.
The
chateau turns almost into a charming place, at least liveable, when you enter at
the garden side. But what makes the crowds (and myself included) go and run to
see that castle are the different defence dispositions like the grating and
gnashing drawbridge with its chains and the interior decoration of the 15th
century (date of the building of the castle) and 16th century. Yes, a castle
entirely of that epoch!! And a dungeon, remains from
 an older castle, maybe the
oldest in France (see below).
Here is an anecdote (Routard): the actual castle was built in a few years from
1465 on, at the orders of Louis XI to protect the city from the Britons. But,
his son, Charles VIII "the courteous", who, like his surname indicates
clearly, had a very "relaxed" character, and solved the war problem by
marrying the pretty Anne de Bretagne in 1491. The castle was just
achieved....and daddy wasn't there anymore!! Thanks to that Bretagne was
reunited with kingdom France. The fans of historical reconstructions will be
overwhelmed by the reconstruction of this marriage in the so-called “salle du
marriage” (the wedding-hall) with its 15 wax personages in natural grandeur
illustrating the famous marriage ceremony. Charles, with its eagle’s nose and
sulky lip is not exactly what we call an Adonis. And existing portraits (Musée
Condé, Chantilly) and tapestries (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Valenciennes) will
confirm that impression.
The amateurs of ancient tapestries and beautiful gothic furnishing will be as
Alice in Wonderland inside the castle.
For the "chemin de ronde" (surveillance path around the castle), you
have a nice view on the Loire, the city and the countryside. At the end of a
garden, buried in greenery and bushes, the ruins of a square dungeon (which I
mentioned at the beginning of this article) edified in the 10th century by
Foulques Nerra.
 The CHATEAU tel
0247967260 is open every day from begin April to end of September 9-
18.30 (21h 15 July to 31 August), October from 9-12.30 and 14.00-18.30. November
to end of March 9-12 and 14-17.
At the other side of the street, a few 16th century houses of which one,
actually a tea-salon, should have been inhabited by Rabelais. We had a very nice
breakfast there. The owner bought especially the fresh bread and croissants for
us.
The EGLISE SAINT-JACQUES, in the centre of the village is unfortunately very
badly restored in a neo-gothic style of last century. It houses a curious
craftsmen museum showing the life of a village in the 19th century
with the professions of that time. The
church keeps a remarkable belfry of the 11th to 13th century, and a slender
spire of the 15th century.
For car freaks there is
something to see in the near countryside.
6 km east of Langeais, descending the river with the N 152, at the Chateau de
Planchoury at Saint-Michel -sur –Loire tel 0247968152 at the MUSEE CADILLAC,
you can admire the Cadillac cars collection of the Belgian Robert Keyaerts: 56
dream cars representing each an epoch, the most important collection in Europe.
The oldest model dates from 1926 and you can see the “Town Cabriolet V16”
from 1933 an Eldorado, which used to belong to Marlene Dietrich but above all a
Dual Cowl Phaeton 1931, unique in the world. Open April to September.
Markets in Langeais: MARCHE
NORMAND is organized two Friday's
monthly, in July and August, until midnight. Info for exact dates at the Tourist
info.
Bibliography
Guide
du Patrimoine, Centre, Val de Loire , by Perouse de Montclos (ed.Hachette
1992)—Het dal van de Loire, by A.Sperber (Brussels, ed.Harenberg 1992),---Par
les champs et par les greves, by G.Flaubert (1885)—Guide du Routard 1998
(ed.Hachette)—de kastelen van Frankrijk, by L.P.Boon (1956)-Anne de Bretagne,
leven en regeren », by J.Van Doren (ed.Alkpress 1994)-« Chateau de
Langeais »(museum folder)
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