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Origin and history

The Cartus barns of Fonbruno, also known as the Chartreux farm, are located in Escoussens (Tarn, Occitanie). Depending on the Chartreuse Notre-Dame-de-Bellevue de Saïx, they derive their name from the place called Fontbruno in the Black Mountain. Their history began in the 16th century, when the Chartreux acquired the seigneury of Escoussens and transformed an old farmhouse (farming, wood, ironwork, glassware) into monacal barns. Hydraulic installations such as the Roudille pool date from this period.

The current buildings — two barns and a mansion — date mainly from the 18th and 19th centuries. In 1792, during the Revolution, P.J. Ladès, inspector of the Military Subsistences, bought the estate as a national good. It refurbishes barns (addition of a barn and stable), frames granite openings, and builds the current mansion. The second barn, damaged, is completely rebuilt. In 1876, the Auban de Marseille family acquired the estate, added a chapel, modernized the mansion and sold it in 1942.

The estate passed in 1965 under the management of the General Council of the Lot, which set up a holiday colony there (concrete buildings added at that time). Today, only the two Cartusian barns have been classified as historical monuments since 1988. Their architecture combines schist bellows, sandstone/granite frames, and levret roofs (local slates). The hydraulic systems — canals, tanks, 19th century lake — bear witness to the ingenuity of the Chartreux.

Barn A, the largest, has a vaulted room with large stone arches that support a frame, with a door in the middle of a hanger decorated with a carved horse head. Barn B, simpler, has a frame and two wide openings to the east. The mansion, in a U-shaped plan with square towers and monumental staircase, preserves elements of the eighteenth century (windows in segmental arch, oculi in sandstone). The chapel, vaulted dogives, dates from 1876.

Originally, Fontbruno was an obedience (rural property without monastic staff), managed by a prosecutor. The Chartreux developed a sophisticated hydraulic policy there, while the Wars of Religion temporarily took refuge there. The initial farmhouse, active at the end of the 15th century, was transformed into an agricultural estate under the Old Regime. The oldest visible remains (cave vaulted from the manor house) date back to 1666, but most of the current structures date back to the 18th to 19th centuries.

The inscription to the historical monuments in 1988 concerns only the two barns (parks B 383 and 384), excluding the mansion and the chapel. The site, at an altitude of 850 m in the forest of Cayroulet, illustrates the adaptation of the Chartreux to a mountainous environment, combining farming, water management, and spiritual withdrawal. Local materials (schist, sandstone, granite) and constructive techniques (voûts, diaphragm arches) reflect this integration into the territory.

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