Château de Gavaudun is situated in the beautiful and quiet Gavaudun Valley (on the River Lede), that runs between Lacapelle Biron (and Chateau Biron) to the north and towards Monflanquin to the south, in the north of the Lot-et-Garonne department.
It is the setting and the castle donjon (keep) that is the highlight of a visit to Gavaudun. Perched astonishingly on a jutting out rocky outcrop, the castle at Gavaudun towers over the village below, and over the valley which it was built to guard over.
History of Gavaudun Castle
The castle was built in the 11th century, in a highly strategic location - the Gavaudun Valley was the main communication route between the Perigord and Agenais regions. Hence the Chateau de Gavaudun played an important role in the region. The original castle was destroyed in the 12th century and rebuilt in the 13th, and it subsequently played a key role in the victory against the English occupation of France.
Apart from its military history, Gavaudun has been occupied since early prehistoric times, and for many centuries had a tradition of iron ore mining and treatment, then later (from about the 17th century) in the manufacture of paper - both industries dependent on the river passing through the valley.
In the middle ages Gavaudun Valley was also a place where lepers got sent - the 'lepers cave' is near the village.
Visiting Gavaudun Castle
There isn't a great deal to see inside the castle, but a vist is still recommended. Even entering the castle is not for the feint-hearted, as you climb up a dark, poor condition stairwell hacked into the rock. There are good views down the valley from the top of the 70 metre high donjon, if your nerve holds out!
The village which developed around the castle is also picturesque, with the quiet river Lède passing through the centre of the village and some ancient houses to admire - there are two substantial houses right on the river in Gavaudun: one opposite the castle entrance and the other a little downstream at the exit of the village. The small Church of Laurenque dates from the same period.
https://www.francethisway.com/places/chateaugavaudun.php

Château de Gavaudun

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The Château de Biron is a castle in the valley of the Lède in the commune of Biron in the Dordogne département of France.
It was the castle from which the Gontaut-Biron took their name, their seat from the twelfth century. Biron was seized by the Cathars in 1211 and retaken by Simon IV de Montfort the following year. The Plantagenets held it at times during the 14th and 15th centuries. Biron was erected as a duché-pairie in 1598, for Charles de Gontaut, created duc de Biron.
The present château bears additions over the centuries that make a picturesque ensemble: a twelfth-century keep, sixteenth-century living quarters, a chapel and vaulted kitchens. The commune purchased the Château de Biron in 1978, with a view to restoring the structure as a tourist draw.
Since 1928, the Château de Biron has been listed as a monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.

Château de Biron

The castle of Ladhuie was built on the banks of the Lot, on the territory of the commune of Montayral, in the department of Lot-et-Garonne.When Edward I took possession of the Agenais, in 1279, after the treaty of Amiens, he was about 1289 to make navigable the Lot to facilitate the transport of goods from Quercy to Bordeaux. He built eleven dams on the Lot at the end of the 13th century in the bailiwick of Penne, on a course of 22 kilometers. He instructed his constable in Bordeaux, of Angolive, to put a sum of 10,000 livres at the disposal of Master Andre to carry out the undertaking. Construction has been entrusted to various contractors. This is how the Lustrac take charge of the construction of a dam. This work begun in 1291 will be carried out quickly at a cost which has not exceeded 4,000 pounds. They were arrested in 1294 when Philip the Fair seized the Agenais and returned it to the King of England in 1303.But in 1311, at the request of the King of England, an inquiry was made into the barrages of Guillaume Cazes, the judge of Agen. To seize tolls, the local lords built fortified buildings nearby. The Tower of Orgueil rests on one of these dams. The castle was then built to control the dam and levy rights of way. During the Hundred Years' War, in 1424, the Tower of Pride, also known as Ladhuie or Laduguie, was taken by Lancelot de la Barthe of the English party. It is taken up by Naudonnet de Lustrac who fights for the King of France. According to Gilles Séraphin, the Ladhuie or Laduguie tower was replaced at the end of the fifteenth century by a manor, perhaps for Armand de Laduguie mentioned between 1502 and 1506. Armand de Laduguie was married to Jeanne de Lustrac, daughter of Anthony I of Lustrac. A second building was erected against the old building at the end of the sixteenth-seventeenth centuries, probably for the Lagoutte family. In 1695, notarial documents mention Jacques de La Goutte, Lord of Buscon, living in his castle of La Duguie, brother of François de La Goutte, lord of Lapoujade in Saint-Vite. The house was enlarged during the first half of the seventeenth century. The castle was seized at the beginning of the Revolution as well as the emigrant Brous Cézerac. He is sold on 24 Thermidor Year II to Jean Maydieu for 160,000 livres. The castle was registered as a historic monument on June 20, 1950.
http://www.frenchchateau.net/chateaux-of-aquitaine/chateau-de-ladhuie.html

Château de Ladhuie

Château de Bonaguil is a castle in the French commune of Saint-Front-sur-Lémance, but actually owned by the neighbouring commune of Fumel in the Lot-et-Garonne département. It has been classified as a Monument historique (historic monument) since 1862.
The Château de Bonaguil was the last of the fortified castles. It was built in the 13th century, but was entirely restructured at the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th centuries by Bérenger de Roquefeuil, who added all of the defensive improvements of the end of the Middle Ages. A marvel of military architecture covering 7500 m², incorporating the latest developments in artillery (both for defence and in adapting the defences for protection against it) it was, however, obsolete when completed. It was never attacked.
First stage
The first castle at Bonaguil was constructed after the middle of the 13th century (between 1259 and 1271 according to Jacques Gardelle), on a rocky spur, probably by Arnaud La Tour de Fumel. The single entrance to the keep, built above a natural cave, was a six metre high door, accessible by ladder.
The first written mention is in 1271, in a charter listing the possessions of the King of France Philippe III le Hardi. At that date, it was a vassal of the fiefdom of Tournon, and was probably just a simple polygonal keep, with a small courtyard surrounded by a wall, with a lower courtyard surrounded by a palisade. The dwelling was not built until the end of the 13th century or even the beginning of the 14th.
The widening of a fracture in the rock allowed a well to be dug to a depth of 47 m (154 ft).
The lords of Bonaguil fought on the side of the King of England in the Hundred Years War. The castle was taken several times, burnt and abandoned, although always the property of the Fumel family.
On 11 November 1380, Jean de Fumel-Pujols, baron of Blanquefort and owner of the castle, married the heiress of Roquefeuil, Jeanne Catherine de Roquefeuil, and dropped his name for the more prestigious name of his wife. Their son Antoine joined together the properties of the two families, and their grandson, Jean de Roquefeuil, moved with his wife Isabeau de Peyre to Bonaguil in 1444.
Developments by Jean de Roquefeuil
Jean de Roquefeuil, who sent his son Antoine to take part in the War of the League of the Public Weal, against the King, made several modifications, as much for defence as comfort:
the walls of the dwelling were raised (E on the plan) and reached the height of the keep (which thus acquired a more massive silhouette)
from 1470 to 1482, the keep was rebuilt, with an overall streamlined shape, in order to better resist artillery
a spiral staircase was installed in a new turret, in the west, increasing the available space
a new dwelling was built to the east of the keep: its length currently stands on the east-south-east against the curtain wall and its openings are orientated to the north-north-east and west-north-west
a ramp was built to provide easier access to the keep.
Of Jean's four sons, out of nine children, it was the third, Bérenger, who survived and inherited the property of his father.
Defensive reinforcement by Bérenger de Roquefeuil
The considerable defence works of the castle have their origin in the lord of Bonaguil's problems with King Charles VII, who condemned him for his violence against serfs and vassals. They were financed thanks to the good fortune of the Roquefeuils, who owned lands in the Gironde and the Golfe du Lion. The works extended over thirty years.
First wall
The main danger at the end of the 15th century came from artillery. For protection, it was necessary to keep the enemy's cannons at a distance. An external wall, 350 m in length, was added to the castle, with lower curtains retaining a mass of earth which cushioned the artillery shots. This curtain wall was reinforced with small towers and equipped with guns. This was the second innovation of this rebuilding: provision for the use of masses of artillery for the defence of the castle, with a total of 104 embrasures for firing.
So the castle used the latest developments in armaments: push back the firing of the assailants by obliging them to set up their cannons further away; make the approach difficult with openings for ground shot; large calibre guns were put on top of the towers (such as the platform on top of the keep) so as to fight at a distance.
The spur on which the castle stands is cut by a large ditch sunk in the rock. A barbican was built beyond the ditch. It was linked by two drawbridges to the body of the castle. It was also defended by several guard towers, allowing a flanking fire from which the arquebuses could cover every angle.
Still with the aim of leaving no point uncovered by fire, caponiers were built in the ditches; these small earthworks were in front of the curtain, allowing the ditch to be swept with fire from the defenders, from one or both sides of the structure.
Finally, boulevards were laid out, partly in the north ditch, to permit rapid movement from one point to another of the fortress, in case of attacks on different parts of the castle; this anticipated the fortresses of the 17th century.
Second system of defence
The earthworks and barbican were only designed to postpone the danger to the heart of the castle, the residential part. This was equally strengthened. Six towers were built – four round towers in the corners, and two towers in the middles of the curtain, a square on in the west and a round tower in the south. The towers allowed greater cover of the curtains: defenders could fire on the sides of assailants who were attacking at the foot of the wall between two towers.
These high towers served, as in the mediaeval castles, to protect the walls thanks to their design. Their height was a guarantee against scaling. The innovation was the treatment of the top, reinforced to provide an artillery platform. The corbels supporting the walkway were replaced with inverted pyramids, much more solid and able to support a much heavier weight – an artillery piece, its carriage and supplies.
Changing fortunes of the castle from the 16th to the 18th century
When Bérenger died in 1530, the castle was not yet adapted for siege warfare, but it remained an imposing fortress.
His son Charles squandered his fortune (on his beautiful wife Blanche de Lettes de Montpezat, it seems) and his sons Honrat and Antoine inherited a reduced fortune. During the Wars of Religion, the two brothers fought in opposite camps, and the castle was taken in 1563. A first restoration took place in 1572. In debt, Antoine had to give the fortress to the lord of Pardhaillan in 1618, before being able to buy it back several years later.
His son Antoine-Alexandre was a marquis, but passed on to his only daughter Marie-Gilberte a castle in a poor state and empty coffers. Married from the death of her father (8 July 1639) to the Marquis of Coligny-Saligny, she devoted herself to the repair and maintenance of the castle. She remarried in 1655 to Claude-Yves de Tourzel, Marquis of Allègre, with whom she had a daughter who married Seignelay, minister of the Colbert family.
François de Roquefeuil, a distant relative with some claim to the castle, took possession of it in 1656, kept and pillaged it for almost a year before abandoning it. Marie-Gilberte lived in Paris for the last years of her life, and abandoned the château de Bonaguil, until her death in 1699. It passed next to François-Gaspard de Montpeyroux, a soldier who almost never lived there, then to his sister, who sold it in 1719 to Jean-Antoine de Pechpeyrou-Beaucaire. His son sold the castle to Marguerite de Fumel, widow of Emmanuel de Giversac, in 1761, who carried out some works to make it more comfortable.
Embellishments of the 18th century
Marguerite de Fumel stayed regularly at the Château de Bonaguil. She converted the castle, notably in the dwelling P in the plan. In this period, the earthworks to the west of the castle were enlarged and laid out as a large terrace and became a pleasant promenade. New apartments were built in the south, outside the inner wall, thus benefitting from a better outlook. The lady of the manor gave feasts. The seven drawbridges became fixed bridges. A part of the ramparts was demolished to give a view over the valley.
The French Revolution and restorations
It was the nephew of Marguerite de Fumel, Joseph-Louis de Fumel, who inherited in 1788. He fled in October 1789, and the castle was declared bien national (national property). The furniture was dispersed, the roofs, floors and wood panelling taken down. Following the Thermidor, the Fumels recovered the castle, but did not live there, and sold it.
It passed from owner to owner until it was purchased in 1860 by the commune of Fumel, who obtained the classification Monument historique(1862) and began some restoration work by B Cavailler in 1868 and by the arrondissement's architect A Gilles in 1876. The architect from the Monument historique restored the keep between 1882 and 1886. Other repairs were made between 1898 and 1900, including covering the watch tower roof with stone tiles in 1900. Further restoration works were carried out in 1948–1950, 1977 and 1985.
The name derives from bonne aiguille (good needle) and refers to the defensive site: a steep, rocky promontory perfectly suited to the siting of a castle.

Château de Bonaguil

The history of Chambert is associated with over 2000 years of Cahors malbec. Sifting through the archives, one can retrace a part of her history back to the 10th century! Chambert fame culminated during the 19th century (in 1854 the vineyard was covering 392 Ha) and declined after General Bataille death in 1914 as her sister (a nun) inherited from the estate and let the vineyard turn wild. Hopefully the full vineyard was replanted in 1974 and organically grown. 
10th Century: The oldest texts describe the grandeur of the vineyards that occupy the expansive hills of Floressas. 
13th to 16th Century: The vineyards of Chambert cover 300ha and are administered in a fortified farm, called “den” with round towers and moats which is situated at the current-day location of the château. The domain is the property of the lords of Floressas; DE BEYNAC in 1318, Viscount LAGORSE-LIMOGES in 1550 and finally the Marquis BRACHET PEYRUSSE in 1630. 
17th Century: Chambert becomes a nobled bourgeois property and is farmed by royals: Madamoiselle LALVALETTE in 1690, a descendant of John BAYLET, Lord of VALETTE, and then later by the family LATHEZE in 1780. Cahors is well known for its red wine and due to the improvements in the navigation of the river Lot, the grapes from Chambert produce wine that is sent all around France, England Russia and America. In 1852, 75% of Cahors wine is exported. 
19th Century: In 1850, an epidemic of odium, a fungus causing mildew on grapes, was raging all throughout the vineyards of France, but due to the arid conditions of the high hills of the Lot Valley, Chambert was initially spared. Unfortunately by 1854, the powdery mildew did finally arrive and destroyed 75% of the Chambert harvest ( reduced to 160L/ha instead of the usual 1000L/ha). In 1855, the Chambert vineyards are replanted as it was thought at the time that this was the only solution to the powdery mildew infestation. 
In 1857, Mélanie LATHEZE married Louis BATAILLE, notaire à Frayssinet le Gélat. Their son, Marie Désiré Pierre Amédée BATAILLE, was born in the château in 1862 and went on to become the youngest French General. Around this time the domaine was producing 400 barrels of Malbec that were exported all throughout Europe and the USA. Before shipping, each Chambert barrel was branded with the Château de Chambert coat of arms. 
In 1873, the “small” Chambert château - a fortification of the 16th century, was renovated and gave way to an imposing and grand castle (see image below) that was protected by a defensive garden of moats and high walls. In 1886, a fire destroyed three quarters of this château and the central portion of the original château was rebuilt and 100 years later two round towers in the style of a 16th century castle were added.
The proliferation of Phylloxera in the late 1800’s gradually killed the vines and the death of General BATAILLE on the Vosges front in 1914 led to the abandonment of the 300 Ha of Chambert vineyards. 
From 1914 to 1973, the vineyard area became fallow land for sheep grazing and, paradoxically, this unfortunate abandonment was a blessing in disguise since the land escaped the intensive chemical agriculture phase of the inter-war and post-war periods. The Chambert site was untouched by chemical treatments, the land was saved, untreated, and ready to start over at the first opportunity. 
In 1973, Marc DELGOULET, a vigneron from the Correze is captivated by the charm and historical grandeur of Château de Chambert and purchases the château and the surrounding hillside. His goal is to return Château de Chambert to it’s former glory and produce the wines that were once again appreciated around the world . In 1974, he selects the best parcels of land with the best exposition, slope and soil type and replants the hillside around the château with Malbec. The vineyards are managed organically: worked by hand, treated with minimal sulfur and fertilized only with a natural compost. Marc’s first vintage in 1978 produces a wine that goes on the win gold at the national competitions of Mâcon, Blaye and Bourg and he is well on his way to reviving the legend of Château de Chambert. Respectful of the vines and a lover of the land, in 1989 Marc contacts Jacques Mell of “Terres en Devenir”, a consulting business for biodynamic farming. It is too expensive for Marc to venture into biodynamics so he continues along an organic path; however, little did Marc know that 25 years later biodynamics would become the destiny of Chambert. With the help of his son Joel, the two continue to improve the reputation of the domaine and the wines of Chambert are still appreciated for their elegance, finesse and reflection of exceptional terroir. 
Today the vineyard property, owned by Philippe Lejeune, covers about 65ha. It is the largest certified organic estate in Cahors (ECOCERT certification) and largest South-West biodynamic estate (DEMETER certification)
http://www.chambert.com

Château de Chambert

The Château de La Coste is a ruined castle in the commune of Grézels in the Lot département of France.
The castle exhibits military architecture of the 14th and 15th centuries. It was restored at the end of the 16th century after it was ruined in 1580 during its capture by Protestant troops. Originally a simple watch tower, the square plan castle is flanked by two massive square towers in the west and two round towers in the east. It comprises a rectangular corps de logis extended by two wings and a curtain wall in the south which encloses the courtyard. The north wing (former stables), having been used as a source of stones to build the house of a former owner, was equipped with an open gallery to ensure weatherproofing. The structure was served by a right handed staircase. The two square towers still have the latrines in the corner made with the corps de logis. The castle was sold as state property in 1793.
The castle is privately owned and closed to the public. It has been listed since 1961 as a monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.