To the traveller who arrives at Chinon from the south or west, the
aspect of the old castle is imposing. What an effect it must have
produced at the period of its full splendour! Originally it was a
fortress situated on an eminence commanding the course of the Vienne
and the fertile plain of Veron. It might be regarded as the key of
lower Touraine. Therefore we see the Romans, the Visigoths, the Franks,
and, later, the Counts of Anjou and Touraine, the Kings of England and
France sparing no efforts to secure its possession. In 462, Frederic,
brother of Theodoric King of the Visigoths, having advanced as far as
the banks of the Loire, seized the Castle of Chinon: up to that time
the Romans had occupied it, and by its favourable position it had
become the last citadel of their power in this part of Gaul. Ægidius
Afranius, the Roman governor of Gaul, hastened into Touraine to recover
Chinon; but he could not do it by force of arms. Despairing of carrying
the place of assault, the Romans blockaded it. The defenders were at
the last extremity from lack of water when a violent storm poured
abundant rain within the ramparts. The Romans raised the siege and the
Visigoths remained masters of the castle until the defeat of Alaric in
the plains of Vouille. The conquering Clovis understood the importance
of this military post and made it one of the ramparts of his kingdom.
The Frankish princes installed themselves there so well that no foe
ever thought of disputing its possession with them. The Carlovingians
were still its masters when feudalism transformed to the profit of the
great barons the precarious title that they held by the confidence of
the sovereign. Thibault the Trickster had Touraine as his share in this
vast parcelling out of France. He had the Castle of Chinon repaired and
often resided there, as in an impregnable fortress. Thibault’s lot in
the partition of the territory was not in the least an agreeable one,
for he had to defend it against the envy of his neighbors. Touraine
for about a century was a prey over which rival powers fought. In
the end it remained with the strongest. The Count of Anjou became
completely master of it after the battle of Nouy, fought on the heights
of Montlouis in 1044. Even in the bosom of this powerful house there
were quarrels over the possession of the Castle of Chinon. An unequal
partition between Geoffroy le Barbu and Foulques le Rechin led to war
between those two brothers. Abandoned and betrayed by his followers,
Geoffroy was made prisoner and cast into the cells of the Castle of
Chinon, where he remained closely immured for the space of eighteen
years with such rigour that he almost lost his reason. Nothing less
than the intervention of Pope Urban II. in 1096 was required to have
him set at liberty.
[Illustration: CHÂTEAU DE CHINON, FRANCE.]
Thanks to a marriage, the house of Anjou mounted the throne of
England and Chinon became a royal possession. Henry Plantagenet,
great-grandson of Foulques le Rechin, brings this fine residence into
new relief. Henry II. made it his favourite manor. He made it the
seat of a royally privileged domain, comprising Cande, Champigny,
La Haye, L’Île Bouchard, Saint Epain, Sainte Maure, Azay le Rideau
and Bourgueil. Henry II. added to the Castle of Chinon a fortress
distinct from the other buildings, with its own ramparts, moats, gates,
drawbridges, buildings for the accommodation of the King, his court
and his archers, and its church dedicated to St. George. From his
donjon keep, the King of England ceaselessly laboured to increase his
territory and his influence on the Continent. By means of his marriage
with Eleanor of Guienne, repudiated by King Louis VII., he had become
more powerful than his sovereign. It seems as if nothing could stay the
course of such success, were it not for discord in his own family. At
war with Philip Augustus, and with his own son the famous Richard Cœur
de Lion, the King of England retired to Chinon. Necessity compelled
him to sign with the King of France the humiliating peace of Azay sur
Cher. “Shame!” he cried, “shame to the vanquished king! Cursed be the
day I was born! Curses upon my two sons!” This fit of fury sent him to
the tomb, July 6, 1189. He was carried without pomp to the Abbey of
Fontévrault, near Chinon, where he had desired to be buried.
Ten years later, another train took the same road: it was that of
Richard Cœur de Lion. Being mortally wounded at the siege of Chaluz,
that prince caused himself to be taken to Chinon, where he quickly
succumbed in cruel agony. He was buried beside Henry II. in the Abbey
of Fontévrault, that celebrated house that has had as abbess fourteen
princesses of the royal blood, and that had deserved the name of
_King’s Cemetery_. In an obscure corner are still to be seen the
admirable statues of the counts of Anjou, masterpieces of the statuary
at the close of the Twelfth Century.
At that time, nothing presaged that the Castle of Chinon was to leave
the hands of the Kings of England, when suddenly a protracted cry of
horror and indignation resounded through the world. John Lackland had
just got rid of his nephew, Arthur of Brittany, by a cowardly murder
at Rouen. Philip Augustus summoned the murderer to appear before the
court of the peers of the realm. After several adjournments regularly
notified, the criminal, not having presented himself, was condemned to
lose the fiefs held from the French crown. The sentence was easy to
deliver, but not so easy to execute. The King of France hastened to
Touraine at the head of an army and took possession of Tours, Loches
and Chinon.
It must be admitted that the Castle of Chinon was valiantly defended;
it was carried by assault after an obstinate struggle in 1205. Philip
Augustus gave it a good garrison. After that day, the English never
set foot in it; and when during our intestine discord they profited by
treason and dominated many of our provinces, the Castle of Chinon was
the last refuge of the monarchy. From there were struck all the blows
that gave France back her independence.
Feudalism had greatly lessened the royal power. Noble efforts had
been made to restore the authority that the king ought never to have
lost. These attempts had produced memorable results; but the great
feudatories were discontented. They wanted to profit by the minority
of Louis IX. and the regency of a woman to recover the power that had
escaped them. Events called St. Louis and Queen Blanche to Chinon. The
young king held a parliament of twenty days at the castle gates. The
rebel lords refused to attend, but their plans were rendered abortive,
thanks to the activity of Blanche of Castile.
Philip Augustus had partly rebuilt the Castle of Chinon: the Thirteenth
Century work is easily visible amid the later constructions. Under the
reign of St. Louis, further works to render this fortress as a whole
more formidable were executed.
In 1308, a great bustle was manifest in the Castle and town of Chinon:
Jacques de Molay, Grand Master of the Order of the Templars, Hughes de
Péraldo, Visitor of France, and the Commanders of Cyprus, Aquitaine and
Normandy had just been brought in. Other Knights of the same Order had
already been confined there. They were all to be taken to Poictiers
where were Pope Clement V. and Philippe le Bel, King of France; but
several of them had fallen ill on the road, so the sovereign pontiff
deputed three cardinals to proceed with the investigation at Chinon.
Every one knows the result of these grave proceedings: the Order of the
Templars was suppressed, and those who were prisoners at Chinon only
left their cells to go to the stake at Paris. They had confessed their
crimes in the question to which they had been put; but most of them
retracted amidst the flames. This frightful execution took place in
1313.
Towards the end of the Fourteenth Century, Charles VI. ceded the duchy
of Touraine and the county of Chinon to his brother Louis, Duke of
Orleans, who was afterwards assassinated by order of John the Fearless,
Duke of Burgundy. This period recalls the most mournful memories of our
history. Our land was ravaged by bands of English, skilful to profit by
our dissensions. At last the hour of deliverance has arrived. France
will now see more prosperous days; and Charles VII., the Victorious,
will stretch his sceptre over the territory formerly subject to his
ancestor.
Charles VII. established his court at Chinon. Joan of Arc came to see
him there and to inaugurate her extraordinary mission beneath the
castle arches. Everybody knows the details of the heroine’s arrival
at Chinon: how she recognized the disguised king in the midst of his
courtiers, revealed a secret known only to himself and God, showed
herself full of confidence in the cause that she was to make triumphant
and finally succeeded in inspiring the hearts of others with the
enthusiasm that overflowed her own.
Thus the first public deeds of the providential mission of Joan of
Arc are connected with Chinon. At this moment, Charles VII. had by
his side another woman of generous heart and strong spirit: this was
the queen, Marie of Anjou. Her influence was greater than historians
have recognized; it was much more salutary and efficacious than that
of Agnes Sorel. When the latter appeared at Chinon for the first time
before the eyes of Charles VII., it was already six months since
Joan of Arc had gone to the stake at Rouen. Is not that enough for
us to say that France had already been saved and that the advice and
remonstrances of Agnes Sorel came too late?
However that may be, the presence of Agnes Sorel at the court of Chinon
was insupportable to the Dauphin, afterwards Louis XI. He even made
it a pretext for a conspiracy against his father. These designs of an
unnatural son did not succeed, but they poisoned the King’s last years.
In 1461, Charles VII. died at Mehun sur Yèvre, and Louis XI. succeeded
to the throne. Louis XI. took up his abode by preference at the Castle
of Plessis-lez-Tours: he often came to Chinon. It was in the environs
of that town, at the Castle of Forges, that he felt the first attack
of the malady that carried him off. Philippe de Commines, Seigneur
d’Argenton, governor of the Castle of Chinon, informs us how this
accident, which was nothing less than an attack of apoplexy, came upon
him.
In the very year of the death of Louis XI. a famous personage in
buffoon literature was born at Chinon. François Rabelais is the most
cynical of writers, and if, as some people assert, he tried to hide his
philosophy beneath the masque of folly, it must be acknowledged that he
succeeded.
After the reign of Louis XI., the Castle of Chinon was very little
frequented by the court. Catherine de’Medici was there in 1560, and
the Duke of Anjou, afterwards Henri III. appeared there at the head
of his army, marching against the Reformers, who were to be so rudely
chastised in the plains of Montoncour.
In 1629, the Princess de Conti, who possessed Chinon by virtue of an
exchange of property with Henry of Lorraine, Duke of Chevreuse, sold
the castle with all its dependencies to Cardinal Richelieu. The sale
gave the signal, so to speak, for the demolition of the royal castle of
the Plantagenets and French monarchs. When the Revolution, that piled
up so many ruins arrived, it found nothing more to do here.
The remains of the old manor are still gigantic. Those high walls,
dismantled curtains, crenellated masonry, and discrowned turrets
harbour glorious memories; but it is not always easy to distinguish
what belongs to each century, or clearly to discern the work of
the Romans or the Visigoths, of Thibault the Trickster, Henry II.,
Philip Augustus, Charles VII., or Louis XI. The greater part of these
ruins, however, is characteristic of the Fifteenth Century. Scarcely
anything remains intact except the belfry tower, now called the _Tour
de l’Horloge_, twenty to twenty-five meters in height. These
picturesque ruins belong to the town of Chinon, having been left to it
by the house of Richelieu.