Frayssinet Castle dans le Cantal

Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The Château de Frayssinet is a medieval building located in the village of Saint-Bonnet-de-Condat, in the Cantal department. Although its exact origins are not specified, its architecture suggests an initial defensive vocation, later transformed into a pleasure castle. A stairway tower, built out-of-work, is one of its outstanding architectural elements, typical of the residential adaptations of medieval castles in modern times.

In 1642, Pierre de Neyrat married Jeanne de La Boulaie, daughter of Jacques, seigneur of Denone, La Gesle and Tourrande. In 1675, Pierre de Neyrat lived at the castle of Frayssinet with his sister-in-law, Charlotte de Brezons. The couple had four sons, including François-Jacques de Neyrat, captain of the Dauphin's light horse, who died in Italy in 1702. The latter, lord of several lands, including Frayssinet, married Anne Le Gros de Grignan in 1695, and their son Antoine, born in 1696, died at the castle in 1728 without a direct heir, leaving his estate to his nephew.

The castle is mentioned in historical sources such as the Statistical Dictionary of Jean-Baptiste de Ribier du Châtelet, which lists the notable monuments of the Cantal. Its history is linked to the local nobility, notably the family of Neyrat, whose members marked the military and religious history of the region in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The transmission of the estate illustrates the estate practices of the Ancien Régime aristocracy, where marriage alliances and inheritances played a central role.

Today, the castle of Frayssinet is part of the heritage of the castles of Haute-Auvergne, bearing witness to the architectural and social evolution of seigneurial residences between the Middle Ages and modern times. Although little documented, its existence reflects the importance of small seigneuries in the territorial and economic organization of the Cantal under the Old Regime.

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