Commandery of Saint-Martin

En un regard

Le château en bref

The Commandery of Saint-Martin, whose remains have been listed as historic monuments since 14 August 1927, was an establishment of the Order of the Temple located on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Vence plain. The commandery was founded after 1195, when Bishop Pierre II de Grimaldi handed the lordship of La Bastide-Saint-Laurent over to the Knights Templar; it was a small commandery responsible for overseeing the Templar possessions in the region rather than a major centre of the order. The complex comprised a first rectangular building of the 12th century housing a chapel and a great hall, then a square fortified enclosure of the 13th century flanked by three turrets, completed by stables, granaries and vaulted cellars. After the arrest of the Templars on 13 January 1307 and the dissolution of the order, the buildings gradually fell into ruin. On the foundations of the former commandery a Provençal-style château was built in 1936, now run as a hotel under the name Château Saint-Martin & Spa, within an estate where remains of the medieval building still survive.