The Château de Montréal is a

château A château (; plural: châteaux) is a manor house or residence of the lord of the manor, or a fine country house of nobility or gentry, with or without fortifications, originally, and still most frequently, in French-speaking regions. Nowaday ...

in the

Dordogne Dordogne ( , or ; ; oc, Dordonha ) is a large rural department in Southwestern France, with its prefecture in Périgueux. Located in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region roughly half-way between the Loire Valley and the Pyrenees, it is named af ...

department Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

located near the commune of

Issac Issac may refer to: Given name * Issac Amaldas, Indian boxer * Issac Bailey, American writer * Issac Blakeney (born 1992), American football wide receiver * Issac Booth (born 1971), American football player * Issac Ryan Brown (born 2005), American ...

, in southwestern

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. It overlooks the valley of the Crempse River. It was built as a

castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...

in the 12th century and rebuilt in the 16th century. It has been classified as a ''

monument historique ''Monument historique'' () is a designation given to some national heritage sites in France. It may also refer to the state procedure in France by which National Heritage protection is extended to a building, a specific part of a building, a coll ...

'' by the

French Ministry of Culture The Ministry of Culture (french: Ministère de la Culture) is the ministry of the Government of France in charge of national museums and the . Its goal is to maintain the French identity through the promotion and protection of the arts (visual, ...

since 1948. Château de Montréal It is now a private residence.

History

Claude de Pontbriand, the Seigneur de Montréal, accompanied the French explorer

Jacques Cartier Jacques Cartier ( , also , , ; br, Jakez Karter; 31 December 14911 September 1557) was a French-Breton maritime explorer for France. Jacques Cartier was the first European to describe and map the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the shores of th ...

on his expedition up the

Saint Lawrence River The St. Lawrence River (french: Fleuve Saint-Laurent, ) is a large river in the middle latitudes of North America. Its headwaters begin flowing from Lake Ontario in a (roughly) northeasterly direction, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, connectin ...

, and was with him on October 3, 1535, when he reached a village of the unknown nation called

Saint Lawrence Iroquoians The St. Lawrence Iroquoians were an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian indigenous peoples in Canada, Indigenous people who existed from the 14th century to about 1580. They concentrated along the shores of the St. Lawrence River in present-day Quebec a ...

, called Hochelaga, on the site of the present day city of

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

. The Pontbriand family built the château in its current form. They also built the chapel Sainte-Épine.The chapel is classified an historic monument, and shelters the reliquary of la Sainte-Épine, taken from the body of the British general John Talbot, killed at the

Battle of Castillon The Battle of Castillon between the forces of England and France took place on 17 July 1453 in Gascony near the town of Castillon-sur-Dordogne (later Castillon-la-Bataille). Historians regard this decisive French victory as marking the end o ...

in 1453. Talbot's heroic death was described by

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

in his play ''Henry IV''. They modernized the double walls of the ramparts, which are very well preserved, and added the Renaissance-style façade of the residence. In summertime, the house is open for visits of the salons, which have a collection of portraits, and the circular library in the tower.

Gardens

The gardens were built upon the ramparts of the fortress at the beginning of the 20th century by

Achille Duchêne Achille Duchêne (1866 — 1947) was a French garden designer who worked in the grand manner established by André Le Nôtre. The son of the landscaper Henri Duchêne, Achille Duchêne was the garden designer most in demand among high French societ ...

. The lower garden is in the Italian style, and features

hibiscus ''Hibiscus'' is a genus of flowering plants in the mallow family, Malvaceae. The genus is quite large, comprising several hundred species that are native to warm temperate, subtropical and tropical regions throughout the world. Member species ...

and yew trees, and walls covered with white roses and white

clematis ''Clematis'' is a genus of about 300 species within the buttercup family, Ranunculaceae. Their garden hybrids have been popular among gardeners, beginning with ''Clematis'' × ''jackmanii'', a garden standby since 1862; more hybrid cultivars ...

. The upper garden is a

Garden à la française The French formal garden, also called the (), is a style of garden based on symmetry and the principle of imposing order on nature. Its epitome is generally considered to be the Gardens of Versailles designed during the 17th century by the l ...

, with ornamental flower beds and a

topiary Topiary is the horticultural practice of training perennial plants by clipping the foliage and twigs of trees, shrubs and subshrubs to develop and maintain clearly defined shapes, whether geometric or fanciful. The term also refers to plants w ...

garden. The garden was badly damaged by a storm in 1999, and has been replanted. The gardens are classified by the Committee of Parks and Gardens of the Ministry of Culture as one of the

Notable Gardens of France The Remarkable Gardens of France is intended to be a list and description, by region, of the more than three hundred gardens classified as ''"Jardins remarquables"'' by the Ministry of Culture (France), Ministry of Culture and the Comi ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Montreal, Chateau De Castles in Nouvelle-Aquitaine Châteaux in Dordogne Gardens in Dordogne Monuments historiques of Dordogne Historic house museums in Nouvelle-Aquitaine Museums in Dordogne

History

Gardens

See also

References