Château de Rully

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Château de Rully

The Château de Rully is a castle in the commune of Rully in the Saône-et-Loire département of France. Located on the side of a hill, the castle dominates the whole region, facing the plain leading to the Saône. To the west, it commands the valley towards Nantoux and Chassey-le-Camp.

1 Description
2 History
3 Bibliography
4 See also
5 External links
6 References

[edit] Description

Château de Rully

At the end of the 14th century, the castle comprised a square keep, three round corner towers and one flanking tower. All the elements, joined together by curtain wall with a covered round walk, were crenelated at the top and protected at the base by a broad, deep ditch, crossed by a single drawbridge, whose site is still visible on the southern face. In the 15th century, the Saint-Leger family added, on the east, north and west of the interior courtyard, a succession of buildings with splendid oak woodwork, supporting the corbelling of the round walk which was covered with flat Burgundian tiles. At the end of the 19th century, alterations caused certain aspects of the mediaeval structure to be hidden: filling of the dry ditches, removal of the drawbridge and the large doors which prevented access to the main courtyard, construction of a neo-gothic building with machicolation inside the courtyard at the the foot of the keep.
The ground floor rooms of the towers are arched. The bedrooms and the corridors are covered with ceilings with exposed beams and joists.
Lava roofed farm buildings, the remainders of the old lower courtyard, surround the large external courtyard and serve as an avenue of honour in front of the gate.

The castle is privately owned and open to visitors. It is listed as a monument historique on the supplementary inventory of the French Ministry of Culture.

[edit] History

851 : Earliest mention
920 : Rully made part of the holdings of the powerful house of Vergy
1194 : The castle belonged to Hugues de Rully
14th century : After the Rully family, the Duke of Burgundy gave the land to a knight returning from the Crusades: Robert de Saint-Léger who married Isabelle de Rully
15th century : the Saint-Léger familt make the castle habitable
1619 : by inheritance, the castle goes to the Montessus family, whose descendants are still owners
Revolutionary era: a certificate of the commune of Rully, in connection with the marquise of Montessus, held for some time in the prison of Chalon, attests that les malheureux ont toujours trouvé en elle une mère, l'opprimé un soutien (the unhappy always found in it a mother, the oppressed support)
Modern era: property of the comte d'Aviau de Ternay, descendant of the Montessus