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Base Mérimée: Monuments historiques · France

Ruines des tours de Carbonnières

Goulles, Corrèze, France

The record

Designation
Historic monument, registered (inscrit)
Protection
inscrit MH
Extent of protection
Tours de Carbonnières (ruines) (cad. C 289) : inscription par arrêté du 23 novembre 1970
Protection dates
1970/11/23 : inscrit MH
Type
édifice fortifié
Main period of construction
Moyen Age
Ownership
propriété de la commune
Commune
Goulles
Département
Corrèze
Region
Nouvelle-Aquitaine
Country
France
Coordinates
45.04426, 2.10289
Mérimée reference
PA00099777

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

5 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1783 map "15 Aurillac." (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

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This record on the Ministère de la Culture's POP platform ↗

The Ministère de la Culture's notice

Les deux tours carrées pont perdu leur couronnement et se dressent sur un mamelon conique très élevé. Chacune d'elle comportait, au-dessus d'une salle basse, trois étages desservis par un escalier à vis logé dans l'angle nord-est dont le départ était au premier étage. La tour sud, dont l'angle sud-est a été disloqué à sa base par le canon lors des guerres de Religion, a ses faces sud et Est à peu près complètement écroulées. La salle inférieure, que couvrait un berceau en plein cintre, était éclairée par une fenêtre étroite. La tour nord avait son unique entrée pratiquée à quatre mètres du sol. L'encadrement en est chanfreiné et l'arc brisé appareillé en plate bande. Elle ouvre sur un vestibule voûté en berceau ouvrant sur un couloir conduisant au départ de l'escalier à vis. Ces deux tours étaient le siège de deux baronnies distinctes appartenant à deux seigneurs différents. En avant de cette dernière tour s'étend un carré de murs ruinés, divisé en deux compartiments. Ces ruines furent sans doute le berceau de Guillaume de Carbonnières que sa mère offrit, enfant, aux moines de Tulle et qui, devenu abbé, releva les ruines de leur monastère en 1107.

English translation

The text above is the record as published by the Ministère de la Culture, in French. The English below is a machine translation made by TreeAlive, not by the Ministère de la Culture; it has not been checked by a person. Where the two differ, the original is the record. Report a translation error: privacy@treealive.com

The two square towers have lost their crowning and stand out on a very elevated conical hillock. Each of them comprised, above a lower room, three storeys served by a spiral staircase housed in the north-east angle whose departure was at the first storey. The south tower, whose south-east angle was dislocated at its base by cannon during the Wars of Religion, has its south and east faces almost completely collapsed. The lower room, which was covered by a barrel vault, was lit by a narrow window. The north tower had its sole entrance made at four metres from the ground. The frame is chamfered and the broken arch laid out as a flat band. It opens onto a vaulted vestibule in barrel vault opening onto a corridor leading to the departure of the spiral staircase. These two towers were the seat of two distinct baronies belonging to two different lords. In front of this last tower extends a square of ruined walls, divided into two compartments. These ruins were doubtless the birthplace of Guillaume of Carbonnières whom his mother offered, as a child, to the monks of Tulle and who, having become abbot, restored the ruins of their monastery in 1107.

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Base Mérimée, Ministère de la Culture, data last updated 2026-09-17, reused under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab). Record text is reproduced unchanged. Ministère de la Culture · Licence Ouverte 2.0
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