En un regard
Le château en bref
The Château de Sanzay, near the village of the same name in the commune of Argenton-les-Vallées (Deux-Sèvres), on the borders of Anjou and Poitou, was built in the 13th century in a marshy area and remodelled in the 19th century. Equipped with a double defensive system (an outer canal and inner moats), it retains from its 13th-century state a gatehouse flanked by two towers with a carriage gate and a postern; a keep whose roof was restored in 2005 and which houses a chapel with Gothic windows, decorated in the 16th century with the coats of arms of the Sanzay family; an artillery tower to the north-east; and a two-level guardhouse. Between 1998 and 2003, a restoration coordinated by Marie-Claude Bakkal-Lagarde cleared the moats, revealing the remains of five vanished towers. Since May 2007, the castle has been home to the association La Colporteuse.