En un regard
Le château en bref
Albinhac Tower is an urban fortified house in the historic centre of Lectoure, probably built in the 13th or 14th century and altered several times afterwards. In the Middle Ages, some thirty residential towers of this type lined the town's main axis, today's rue Nationale: they were primarily dwellings, weakly defended, and their height displayed the standing of the families who occupied them. The building combines a square two-storey residence with a square tower of the same width attached to the north, one storey taller and rising to about nineteen metres. A round corbelled turret stands out at the north-east corner. The ground floor, almost windowless, opens through a pointed-arch doorway protected by a machicolation. A truncated opening suggests that the tower was lowered, perhaps after the siege of Lectoure by the troops of Louis XI in 1473. A mullioned window was pierced in the 16th century and an opening was reworked in the 18th century. Long hidden by the low houses of the grand-rue, the tower became visible from rue Nationale at the end of the 20th century, when demolitions opened a small square where a planted square evokes a medieval garden. It features in the heritage trail proposed by the tourist office.
