Royseux Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Royseux Castle, at Vierset-Barse (in the municipality of Modave), on the banks of the Hoyoux, is a small fortified manor house consisting of a square keep, a residential wing and a farm, now owned separately. The fief is first mentioned in 1249, held of Wautier II de Barse according to the historian Albert Lemeunier, and it changed hands often in the sixteenth century (Chrisgnée, Bois, Hodister) before belonging to Mathias de Fléron from 1688 to 1696. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries it passed to the d'Overschie de Neeryssche family, apparently then to the Fraigneux family, and then, from 1927 to 1978, to the Lamarche family. Built of rubble sandstone and limestone, the four-storey keep, raised on almost windowless cellars, is linked to a two-storey residential wing and to a second square tower; the manor was formerly surrounded by water, and a bridge leading to the outer courtyard survives, buried. The buildings, which are not listed, form a private property that is not open to visitors.