Donjon de la Boyle

English translation

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History

Castle of the 15th century, partly dismantled in 1628. The surviving keep appears to have constituted the essential part of the castle. This construction presents a rectangular plan with, in the middle of the south-west façade, a turret with three cut-off bays containing the spiral staircase accessing the three storeys. The ground floor, raised above a basement vaulted in barrel vault, is divided into two rooms vaulted with profiled ribs with fillet bordered by a cavetto on each side. These ribs spring into the angles from a circular key carved with a shield. Each of these rooms possesses a vast fireplace. The larger room served as a kitchen. A door with a lintel ornamented with prismatic mouldings whose ends penetrate the upper part of the moulured jambs in quarter-round, connects each room with the staircase cage. The window embrasures feature benches. On each storey the same arrangement is found, with some differences: the rooms are covered with a wooden ceiling; the upper rooms do not have fireplaces. The staircase emerges at its upper part onto the wall-walk pierced with machicolations and carried on corbelling over a row of corbels. It is pierced towards the angles with loopholes. A hood surmounted by an exhaust pipe forms like a chimney in the open air.