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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The Château de la Vassaldie, located to the north of the village of Gout-Rossignol in Dordogne, is a classical building built between 1706 and 1714, in the location of an ancient medieval mansion. It consists of a one-storey central house body, flanked by two rectangular mansard roof pavilions, all topped by a semicircular pediment decorated with a cartridge. The set, facing south, overlooks a courtyard closed by commons ( stables, barns, cellars and cuvier) and two tanks surrounding the entrance gate, reflecting an autarchic organization typical of the wine estates of the era.

The facades, roofs, gate, cisterns, aisle of charms and fence walls were listed as historical monuments on 17 March 1992. The castle, originally the heart of an active winery until the 20th century, incorporates medieval remains like a bread oven in its eastern outbuildings. Inside, the distribution was changed in the late 19th or early 20th century, with a shift of the stairwell and the creation of a corridor upstairs. The estate derives its name from the noble family of Vassal, former owners.

The site illustrates the classical rural architecture of the early 18th century, where agricultural buildings (potager, well, courtyards) and decorative elements (gargoyles, balusters, skylights) revolve around a central courtyard. The tanks, fed by rainwater from the roofs, served to water the animals and to clean the barrels, stressing the functional character of the estate. Although the access quail has disappeared, the gate and fence walls retain the historic right of way of the site, today private property.

The interior decorations and structure have undergone late transformations, including the removal of the central staircase in favour of a new spatial organization. The eastern communes, encompassing a primitive farm, house two covets and an old oven, testimonies of the evolution of the site. The castle, an example of architectural and economic rationality, embodies the transition between the feudal mansion and the modern agricultural estate, marked by the rise of viticulture in Périgord before its decline in the 20th century.

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