It’s cold, despite the fire blazing in the fireplace. The March sun floods the golden facade made of this Sarladaise stone whose warm yellow shines. Glued to the cliff, the fortified house of Reignac, in the town of Tursac, in the Dordogne, is still a light spot on the gray in places mossy rock. Seventy years ago, people still lived here, under its stone ceilings. Twenty thousand years ago, others were already living there.
The place, more unusual castle of Périgord, has it changed a lot? Yes, of course, but the main thing is still there: this idea of protecting yourself by sinking into the bowels of the earth, of building high up, of using everything around you to create and protect your home. , to merge in a single place the solidity of nature and the inventiveness of man.
In the Magdalenian (between 17,000 and 14,000 BC), these caves were already occupied, as shown by archaeological excavations begun in 1952 under the aegis of archaeologist Alain Roussot and which brought to light carved stones and arrowheads. From the Xand century, troglodyte dwellings began to be built. In the fourteenthand century, the fortified house stood. In 1508, the first windows were drilled there. In the XVIIIand century, the castle housed the lord, his family, a groom, a chambermaid, a valet, a cook and a falconer, who also acted as a dog handler.
It was almost impregnable: twelve guns were installed on the facade. The house depended on an area of 120 hectares where forty people worked on ten farms. In 1952, the Comtesse de Thy de Milly, the ultimate occupant, who still heated herself there with wood, sold the residence to a doctor, Doctor Hulin, who then ceded it to the city of Bordeaux.
Today the largest troglodyte house in France, the fortified house rises to four floors. At the very top, a very impressive fortified shelter overlooks the void. Below, sheep graze, some straying onto the road and blocking the few cars with their procrastination. The Vézère flows peaceful and silty waves.
The flight of a kestrel
Reserved for centuries for private use, the “ castle-cliff” can be visited today. In 2005, the city of Bordeaux sold it, and it fell into the hands of Jean-Max Touron. At 82, more dashing than a kid, going up and up the steep stairs he could climb with his eyes closed, the master of the place comes every day to take the pulse of the site.
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