Tonquédec Castle (France)

It is to the south of an old feudal mound placed at the end of the rocky spur that dominates the valley of the Leguer that was built the castle of the lords of Coëtmen, in Tonquédec.

Owned by a certain Prigent, lord of this place from the end of the 12th century, he passed to the favor of the marriage of his daughter in the family of Coëtmen who will remain owner until the early sixteenth century. During the succession wars that bloody the duchy of Brittany, the primitive stone castle was largely destroyed in 1394.

From 1406 and after being sided with the Duke of Brittany, Roland III Coëtmen undertakes the reconstruction of the North home and its east wing. Throughout the fifteenth century, his successors will endeavor to enlarge, complete, modernize and adapt to the development of artillery. It is from this period that most of the buildings we know today date.

In the first half of the sixteenth century and up to the first half of the seventeenth century, by the game of inheritance, the estate becomes property of the family of Acigné and the family Gouyon de la Moussaye, who will undertake the repair and the complement of the enclosure of the front yard.

In the first half of the 17th century, after the dismantling of the building by order of Richelieu, the castle was sold to the Quengo family. Undergoing a long decline in the following centuries, the whole is sold in 1879 to a merchant who intends to exploit it in quarry stones.

While his daughter married Count Pierre de Rougé, the Marquis de Keroüartz managed to acquire the ruins of the castle and offered them to his daughter, the family of Coëtmen having died in that of Rougé in 1749. The last baron of Coëtmen, before the Revolution, was thus Bonabes Louis Victurnien Alexis (1778-1838), marquis of Rougé, future peer of France and marshal of camp, grandfather of the count Pierre de Rougé (1855-1912).

The castle of Tonquédec was classified among the Historical Monuments by list of 1862.

Since the 1950s, important works of consolidation and crystallization of the ruins are led by the owners, under the direction of successive chief architects, with the help of the department, the region and the region. State.

Most remains are consolidated in the late 1990s and give the castle its current appearance. The last intervention (Rouge Tower or North Dungeon) took place in 2005-2006.

The castral ensemble, consisting of two distinct spaces, has a morphology related to the topography of the site on which it is established: in the North is a high court whose access is controlled by a castle with a drawbridge today gone.

It constitutes an esplanade around which are organized the ruins of the various lodgings and towers (the tower of Rougé and the tower of Acigné), it sheltered the spaces of life and the noble parts of the castle. To the south is a front yard or low courtyard surrounded by thick curtain walls located beyond the moat and intended to protect the original enclosure from the progress of the artillery.

Tonquédec Castle today presents a coherent architectural ensemble quite exceptional with its eleven towers including two dungeons connected to the main building by drawbridge.

The building is a major witness of the military architecture of the Middle Ages and is also an ideal place to discover the craftsmanship, the art of war and daily life in a castle between the Twelfth and sixteenth century.