Grand tour de Château-Chinon

The hike

The Haut Morvan region, of which Château-Chinon is the main town, has been occupied since Neolithic times, as evidenced by the archaeological remains of excavated sites in the surrounding area. After the troubled period of the great invasions at the end of the Celtic world and the beginning of the Middle Ages, the fragmentation of the Frankish kingdom into countless fiefs brought Castro Canino under the authority of the Abbey of Cluny. The group of modest houses gradually became a town, protected by walls from which emerged the wooden bell tower of the first church, which was dominated by a small fortified castle erected in the 13th century. Château-Chinon thus passed through the Middle Ages, first as a châtellenie, then as a seigneury, and finally as a county. In the 15th century, the château was given as a dowry by Isabeau de Bourbon to Charles the Bold on her marriage. The wars between King Louis XI and the Duke of Burgundy led to the castle being burnt down, and the Wars of Religion completed its dismantling.