Tours Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Tours Castle, in the Indre-et-Loire department, stands on the bank of the Loire in the oldest quarter of Tours, close to the Cathedral of Saint-Gatien. It was built over the remains of the ancient city from which Tours takes its origin. Notwithstanding the extent of its foundations, partly revealed by excavations in the 1970s, it is a very modest trace of an eleventh-century medieval comital castle, as modified and enlarged in the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, when it acquired the status of a royal residence. Almost entirely destroyed in the eighteenth century, its two remaining towers were incorporated into a new building used by the army from the Revolution onwards. After serving as a barracks, it was in this singular configuration that it was rescued from oblivion and restored in the second half of the twentieth century. It has been partially listed as a monument historique since 20 August 1913, the other part having been entered on the supplementary inventory on 21 November 1973. It today houses cultural and heritage activities.