Albo Enclosures

En un regard

Le château en bref

The Albo enclosures form a group of circular earthen structures located on the moorland overlooking the hamlet of Albos, in the commune of Mauriac, in the Cantal. Described as early as 1856 by the local scholar Em. Delalo, they include in particular a large enclosure about 21 to 22 metres in diameter to the north-west of the village, accompanied by three nearby menhirs (two of which now lie on the ground), as well as a group of five smaller enclosures, regularly arranged on a height overlooking the village, the largest reaching about 17 metres in diameter. In the absence of archaeological finds within the enclosures themselves – only Roman tiles have been identified on the village site, attesting to a later Gallo-Roman occupation – their exact function remains uncertain; Delalo put forward, as a hypothesis, that they were enclosures of a cultic nature. It is thus an archaeological site predating any attested castral occupation rather than a castle in the strict sense.