Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The castle of Mauhic was built by Auger de Lau, son of Jeanne d'Averon and Thibaut de Lau, as evidenced by his will dated 1512. This document constitutes the first written trace of the monument, then owned by the Lau family. The lineage of Mauhic's Lau died in 1695 with the marriage of Claire Marguerite de Lau to Daniel de Montesquiou, lieutenant general of the King's Army and commander of Saint Louis. When she died in 1715, she bequeathed the estate to her brother-in-law, Clement de Montesquiou, Abbé de Berdoues, who undertook important work to modernize the building according to the 18th century standards.

Under Clement de Montesquiou, chaplain of the castle, the estate was embellished and enlarged, passing to nearly 450 hectares including vineyards, meadows, woods and farmhouses. When he died in 1732, the property belonged to his nephew Antoine de Médrano, major in the Roure regiment, whose family retained Mauhic until the Revolution. The last seigneur, Jean-Marie de Médrano, was guillotined in 1794 for concealing noble possessions, leaving a 7-year-old daughter, Anne, heiress of a confiscated heritage and partly destroyed.

The Revolution dispersed the property of the Medrano: silverware was melted, furniture disappeared, and only the house was returned in 1808 to Étienne de Médrano, Jean-Marie's brother. Anne de Médrano, an orphan at the age of 9, was raised by the estate's tenants before marrying Jean-François Sansot, an 18-year-old commoner, in 1808. Their union gave five children, marking the end of Mauhic's seigneurial era, transformed since into an agricultural and wine estate, with a renovated tower dedicated to seasonal rental.

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