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Key figures

Origin and history

The castle of the Tour de Sennecey stands on the town of Sennecey-le-Grand, in Saône-et-Loire, in a flat landscape characteristic of Burgundy-Franche-Comté. Its architecture consists of a central house body, framed by two 15th century towers, and commons organized in U around an open courtyard in the east. An isolated square tower, probably a vestige of early construction, dominates the northeast corner. This tower, once lined with deep walls and ditches, lost its merlons at the end of the 18th century to adopt a roof in the pavilion. In the east, a 19th century residence, built on a slight eminence, completes the whole.

The history of the castle dates back to the 12th century, when it belonged to the Gallois family of Arlay, native to the County of Burgundy. This line of hereditary provosts, distinct from the House of Chalon-Arlay, transmitted the fief to the Vuillafans at the beginning of the 14th century by the marriage of Jeanne la Galloise d'Arlay with Hugues de Vuillafans. The Vuillafans, lords of Château-Vieux and Château-Neuf near Ornans, kept the Tower of Sennecey until the extinction of their lineage in 1576. The fief was then sold to Claude de Bauffremont, who dismantled the fortifications and integrated the estate into the park of his nearby residence of Sennecey.

In the 15th century, the Tower of Sennecey passed to the Saint-Seine through the marriage of Huguette de Vuillafans with Charles de Saint-Seine. At that time, the castle became a moving fiefdom under the land of Sennecey, as evidenced by an act in which Huguette, a widow, acknowledged to hold the Tower of Pierre de Bauffremont. After his death, the estate fell to his relative Antoinette Bouchard d'Aubeterre, wife of Jean V de Parthenay-l-Archêque, seigneur of Soubise. In 1576 Antoinette sold his share to Claude de Bauffremont, marking the end of his feudal independence.

The arms of the successive families reflect their prestige: the Gallese of Arlay were wearing "goats to the golden band charged with a d'azur star", while the Vuillafans were wearing "silver with the fascice of sand", simplified by Hugues de Vuillafans in 1390. These coats of arms, as well as the architectural transformations (dismantling of fortifications, addition of the house of the nineteenth century), illustrate the evolution of the castle, today private property and not open to the visit.

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