Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

Muges Castle, located in Damazan in Lot-et-Garonne, was built in the second half of the eighteenth century. It was commissioned by the Bordeaux shipowner Jacques Henry, who entrusted it to the architect André Mollié, known for his work on the Nairac (Barsac) and Aiguillon castles. The estate, organized around a U-shaped plan, includes a central house with pavilions, communes, as well as an orange and vegetable garden-fruiter preserved from the beginning.

The architecture of the castle is distinguished by its protruding central forebody, which houses the main entrance, and its 18th-century interior decorations, including panelling, fireplaces and a wrought iron ramp staircase. The landscaped park, located in front of the northern façade, includes groves, a water course, a parker and family graves. The whole, including the communes and orangery, was included in the inventory of historical monuments on 8 December 2008.

The castle appears already mentioned under the name Meuges on the topographic map of the Guyenne prepared by Belleyme around 1763-1764, suggesting an earlier occupation of the site. The bodies of buildings perpendicular to the main house, as well as a third house to the east, could date from the early nineteenth or late eighteenth century. Today, the estate belongs to a private society and retains remarkable architectural and landscape elements, witness to its history linked to Bordeaux aristocracy and regional neoclassical architecture.

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