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Origin and history

Rosemont Castle, located in the commune of Luthenay-Uxeloup in the Nièvre department, is a castle built in the 13th century. Originally a simple strong house, it belonged in 1233 to William, Sire de Thianges, and belonged to the fief of the Count of Nevers. Surrounded by deep ditches and equipped with seven cylindrical towers connected by courtines, it housed a chapel dedicated to Marie-Madeleine, mentioned in a sill of 1478. The thick walls, niches and traces of monumental chimneys still testify to its defensive and residential importance.

In 1597, the castle, then owned by the Count of Nevers, was sold by Henriette de Clèves, Duchess of Nevers, to Jérôme de la Chasseigne. He then passed into the hands of the Chambrun family of Uxeloup, notables and jurists, who made it a seigneury with rights of high, medium and low justice. During the Revolution, under the Terror, the owners were arrested: the father and the son, accused of having immigrated and then returning clandestinely after the fall of the monarchy, were guillotined in Paris on 8 Thermidor, the eve of the fall of Robespierre.

Rosemont Castle is also linked to a local legend that fairies had participated in its construction in one night. Another version says that the stones moved themselves at the call of the fairies, using the water of the nearby stream to mason them. These popular narratives add a mystical dimension to this historic monument, classified as historical monuments since October 20, 1923.

In 1863 the painter Johan Barthold Jongkind immortalized the ruins of the castle in a painting exhibited at the Musée d'Orsay, participating in the Salon des Refuss. This painting contributes to the artistic fame of the castle, whose remains continue to fascinate with their history and architecture.

Today, the ruins of Rosemont Castle, with their ditches, towers and traces of their old layouts, offer a valuable testimony to medieval military architecture and to the historical upheavals that marked the region, from feudalism to the French Revolution.

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