Villebon Castle (France)

Military building square plan built late fourteenth during the Hundred Years War, on a Franco-English border, flanked by six crenellated towers, surrounded by deep moats - still in water - and decorated with a drawbridge still operated every day, the castle gives off the impression of a severe medieval fortress.

Jean d'Estouteville, returning from the wars of Italy, brings the taste of the Renaissance: opening mullioned windows, layout of the inner courtyard, construction of the chapel.

In the 17th century, Sully draws the park around the water features, the canals and the dovecote. French wooded perspectives lead to the statue of Diana. Since the 18th century, the park has been home to a herd of deer. In the 19th century, construction of the orangery and stables in harmony with the ancestral complex.

For 600 years, the castle has received many heads of state: Charles VI, Charles VII, Louis XI, Francis I, Henri IV, Stanislas Leczinski, Paul Deschanel, General de Gaulle and Valery Giscard d'Estaing.

Villebon has only been sold twice since its construction. It was the property of four families, the Estouteville, Bethune Sully - the great Sully died in 1641, Pontoi Pontcarré and La Raudière which opened to visit in 1994.

"On the side of Guermantes": in his first manuscript, Proust - native of Illiers-Combray - headline "on the side of Villebon".

Private property, inhabited family, the castle and the chapel are classified historical monuments (MH) since 1927, the dovecote registered since 1981.