Chapter IV: The Châteaux of Other Days

The art and architecture of Normandy with respect to religious edifices, and not less with regard to its feudal châteaux, is of a peculiar variety, quite apart from the other types seen in France.

The birth of Norman architecture, as it is commonly known, was undoubtedly an out-growth of the older Romanesque.

The Scandinavian conquest of Neustria left no arts or evidences of art that would demonstrate to the least degree that these peoples brought any innovations of building with them.

The Merovingian period itself has left but few remains which are characteristic of any development of artistic taste. Hence such monuments as exist of Merovingian or the prehistoric civilizations are very meagre, and comprise no structures of any magnitude.

The Romans, however, coming between the two, have left very visible and splendid remains of their sojourn here,--though to-day in a ruinous condition,--the great theatre at Lillebonne being perhaps the chief and the most magnificent. Other important remains of this period are found near Lisieux, and Valognes, in the Cotentin.

The Romans built many defences in the region, particularly Limes, near Dieppe, and Chatelliers in the Department of the Orne. Generally the Roman defences in Lower Normandy were disposed in a double range of walls; and from these developed on a smaller scale the feudal château of later times.

Rollon and his companions had given a great impetus to the feudal régime in the duchy, and rival seigneurs built themselves strongholds, if possible, more formidable than those of their neighbours. By the ninth century this fortress-building gave way to establishments endowed with more comforts and luxuries of a domestic nature, but they continued to be fortified, as they were for a long time after.

The remains of the Châteaux of Arques, Domfront, Falaise (the birthplace of the Conqueror), Gisors, and Gaillard (the “daughter of a year” of Richard the Lion-hearted) were all wonders of their time.

All travellers for pleasure or edification have a lively interest in châteaux, whether they be of the feudal variety of fortress, or the comparatively modern domestic establishments of the Renaissance period.

Normandy had quite a representative share of both classes of these mediæval monuments, and their existing remains to-day are numerous and admirably cared for, ruins though many of them be.

According to Viollet-le-Duc, the Normans were the first to apply defensive works to a residential château, that is, an edifice which was primarily something more than a fortress.

Such strongly defended châteaux as that of Arques near Dieppe, whose donjon was the last to surrender to the French king after the conquering of the province, were exceedingly rare.

In general, the Norman châteaux of the eleventh and twelfth centuries were little more than a rectangular or round donjon, surrounded by exterior works of relatively little strategic importance. They were always defended by a deep fosse, and by subterranean passages which would allow the defending forces to move under cover from one point to another; and in addition, they were frequently placed upon the summit of a hill or rocky promontory, as was the case at Les Andelys, La Roche-Guyon, Falaise, and Domfront.

The Norman influence of château-building spread widely. England, of course, followed speedily; but their keeps or donjons were more often rectangular and seldom circular.

In the Vendée at Ponzanges, at Beaugency, on the Loire at Montrichard, and at Loches, the Norman influence prevailed, but still the most complete and successful examples were confined to Norman soil.

In the thirteenth century the châteaux throughout France all began to be built on one specific plan and arrangement, keeping, meanwhile, to the best traditions of Merovingian and Carlovingian times.

By the end of the thirteenth century the feudality, more or less ruined by the Crusades, were no longer in a position to build great independent fortresses; and the château by the middle of the century following had been shorn of many of its former fortifying attributes and became merely the great luxurious habitation of the seigneurs who, in other days, would have made war, or been attacked on their own account.

Some sort of defences they always retained, at least until a much later date; a fortified gateway, perhaps, a crenelated battlement, partly for use and partly for decorative purposes, and a moat, though oftentimes it was a dry one from the absence of near-by water.

By the time the fifteenth century had dawned many of the old châteaux of Normandy had been repaired, restored, or rebuilt, and many new edifices were erected; but with the Renaissance a distinctly new type was created,--that of a palatial country-house, which to all intents and purposes may be classed generally as modern châteaux, even though they may have been built up from ancient foundations.

Of this class in Normandy the most prominent were the magnificent establishment of the Archbishops of Rouen at Gaillon, the Château Inférieure at La Roche-Guyon, the Châteaux d’Eu, d’Anet, and Fontaine Henri.

If one could trace the history of all the châteaux of France, or even of Normandy and Brittany, to which are attached facts of historical or romantic purport, or which are endowed with artistic tributes, or are picturesquely environed, the results would make a formidable and most interesting work.

In France by the end of the ninth century there were some twenty thousand châteaux, so recognized by their own individual names.

The châtelain, or feudal lord, was a veritable king in his own domain, with his standard, his court of justice, and his vassals; and, quite rightly, in many cases he said to his people, “I will defend you against the enemy, and give you the right of refuge behind the thick walls of my château; at the moment of danger the pont-levis will lower for you, your wives, and your children.”

The discussion of the rights or wrongs of the feudal system is too big a subject to have place here; and, while the serfs of a former day may have suffered in many instances, there was a certain paternal care which doubtless more than overshadowed the ill deeds of the comparatively few overbearing and tyrannical lords.

Not every tenantless and ruined château or seigneurial manor of Normandy is a monument of greed and rapacity, and one need not conjure up a picture of other days, with peasants’ fields trampled and uptorn, and cattle and grain seized, in order to draw disparaging contrasts as compared with the times in which we live.

The history of feudalism is a long and lurid one in many respects; but there is much of the domestic life of the times which points again and again to the fact that the overlord and his serfs were not in far different relations than the king and his vassals, or the landlord and tenant of to-day.

Time was when a certain class of feudal barons were robbers who lived in moated and turreted castles and raided on the peasants beneath their walls, or compelled them to bring to their castles the products of the fields; but this was not so common in Normandy as elsewhere, and was more German than French. If one is to believe the chronicles of the feudal lords of Normandy and the northwest of France, there were a great many who promulgated a law much more charitable and fair than that in force in many a “boss-ridden” community of to-day, in England or America.

When the Franks became masters of Gaul they were quite content to let the old system of administration still obtain, and to confide to some count the governorship of the cities. He was usually a person who was subservient to the governor of the district, who, on his part, deferred to the heads of the province and the kingdom.

The office was hereditary in most cases; and, as the possessors of benefices which were withheld from the masses, they at first demanded an allegiance which, in later times, came to be greatly abridged.

This was the beginning of the feudal system in France. It became complete when Charles the Bold consecrated the hereditary offices by the “_Capitulaire de Kiersi-sur-Oise_,” in 877.

Each seigneur reigned in his fief over his serfs and vassals; and he in turn was subordinate to the count or duke, a rank higher up, the count himself regulating his movements and actions according to the will of the king.

Under the feudal system the government offered great opportunities for irregularities, and the Roman law and rulings practically disappeared from all but the ecclesiastical divisions.

From the tenth to the fourteenth centuries France was divided into as many petty states as there were cantons or châteaux; and, so far as intercommunication for purposes of commerce were concerned, the only relations with the outside world were by the aid of great periodical fairs, such as were held at Beaucaire in Provence, the most celebrated of all, where the volume of trade was second only to that of Nijni-Novgorod in Russia. In the north this great fair found its counterparts at St. Denis, near Paris, and at Guibray, near Falaise in Normandy, which was next to Beaucaire in magnitude and importance. As to other outside communications, it developed largely along the line of raids and warlike incursions into neighbouring territory, as a result of jealousy and envy between the various seigneurs. The only other opportunities offered for the lower classes to mingle with the great world, beyond the feudal territory which claimed them for its own, was through the means of religious pilgrimages and the Crusades.

This description to a great extent applies only to the châteaux of the powerful and wealthy seigneurs.

One then comes to the small nobility and their manor-houses, which were only less grand and luxurious in degree, not in kind. They were not fortified, save by an encircling wall, often of great height and thickness, which enclosed the whole domestic establishment and its home grounds. The manor-house of the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries took frequent root in Normandy, and was often very splendid in its appointments and proportions.

The château of to-day, as one finds it in France, that is, the strictly modern edifice, which often bears the high-sounding name of château, is nothing more than a country-house of a small manufacturer or merchant; who, after thirty or forty years of a strenuous life, has married off his daughters and sons, and wishes to settle down in the country, and surround himself and his wife with the comforts of life and amid a glamour which, he fancies, somewhat approaches the splendour of the olden times.

All this is commendable enough, of course, and it is much better that such a châtelain should build a brand-new red brick and green-and-yellow tiled pompous edifice, with a plaster cat on the ridge-pole, than that he should buy and seek to remodel in new style a really good old-time edifice.

With the inherent good taste undoubtedly possessed by the French, it is astonishing how ugly and bizarre their modern country-houses are, examples of which one often sees in Normandy, along the Seine in the suburbs of Rouen, or in the neighbourhood of Dieppe or Trouville.

In the blazonry of the arms of the nobility of France, the château has a supreme significance. Wherever it is seen incorporated in quarterings, whether with a single tower or three, it signifies that the châtelain thereof has rendered some signal service to the state of France in its royal days.

Renaissance architecture in Normandy never achieved the magnitude that it did elsewhere in France, albeit certain notable structures yet exist to tell of the excellence of its comparatively few examples.

In the beginning Pierre Fain and Guillaume Senault built the archiepiscopal château at Gaillon, truly one of the wonders of the Renaissance. Roland Leroux erected that highly ornate tomb of the Amboise cardinals in Rouen’s cathedral, which, however, must be considered as merely a decorative, and not a constructive, work. In Caen and its environs Hector Sohier and a truly great unknown exercised their genius between 1515 and 1545. At Gisors, three generations of architects by the name of Grappin, Jean I., Robert, and Jean II., proved their originality.

This was the start made which culminated in the Hôtel Bourgtheroulde and the Palais de Justice at Rouen.

If the notable examples of early Renaissance in Normandy are not so numerous as elsewhere, they are certainly as beautiful, and reflect great credit upon their designers.

Throughout the Caux, in Normandy, there are innumerable seventeenth and eighteenth century châteaux. They do not rise to the splendour of the great Renaissance edifices of the Loire, neither in point of grandeur, excellence of their artistic embellishment, nor in their historical reminiscence. They are not so very large; their architecture is in general a great fall from that of the Renaissance beauties of the preceding centuries, and only infrequently were their associations intimately related with the court.

In spite of all this they exhibit many excellencies of detail, and, if simply built, are at least in much better taste and more appealing form than seventeenth-century architecture in general. Many of them are of brick, and are of imposing aspect, when considered from the point of view of great country-houses alone. Frequently they are preceded by flower-gardens, which are in turn faced with greensward, in most delightful fashion. Great avenues of trees lead from the highroad, and generally the aspect is one of great comfort, if not of extravagant luxury.

To-day, in many instances, these great domains are simply what are known as “high-farms,” where the gentleman farmer who lives in the great house is in far better odour than the country squire in England, principally from the reason that he often rents, sells, or works in shares such a part of his land as he does not work direct. This is an admirable system, which works wonderfully well throughout France, and should be studied by agriculturists and economists elsewhere.