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Origin and history

The Château de Veauce is a castle built between the 11th and 13th centuries on a rocky promontory in Veauce, in the department of the Allier (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes). It consists of several buildings organized around a courtyard of honour, with five towers dating from the thirteenth, fourteenth and sixteenth centuries. The site was largely redesigned in the 19th century, notably by Baron Charles de Cadier de Veauce, who added neo-medieval elements while retaining old structures such as a 15th century house or a miniature turnbride.

Before the castle, a Benedictine convent occupied the place before the year 800. A first castle was erected around 808 under Charlemagne, then rebuilt in the 11th and 13th centuries. Owned by Bourbon in the 12th century, it became a baronie in 1400 under Louis II of Bourbon. After the death of the connétable Charles III de Bourbon in 1527, the estate rose directly from the crown. Several noble families succeeded until the 20th century, including the Cadier de Veauce, which undertook its restoration between 1841 and 1846.

The castle is famous for its legend of the ghost of Lucie, a young dead servant imprisoned in the tower of the Clock in the 16th century. This story, popularized in the 20th century by the owner Ephraim Tagori and a show by France Inter in 1984, attracts paranormal enthusiasts. Since 2002, the castle, classified as a historical monument, has been preserved by the Universum endowment fund (formerly Calligrammaton), which makes it an accessible cultural site. Successive protections (1985, 1986, 2011) cover its enclosure, outbuildings and roofs.

The five towers of the castle illustrate its architectural evolution: the square tower (XI century), the watch tower (XIIIe, 45 m high), the dungeon called "undressed" (XIIIe-XIXe), the clock tower (XIIIe, linked to the legend of Lucie), and the access tower (XVIe). The Charroux stone, a fossil that was holed by worms 23 million years ago, characterizes the base of the watch tower. In 2006, a partial collapse of the dungeon accelerated its degradation, before its recovery by Elisabeth Mincer in 2002.

The gardens, the Colettes forest in the west and the village of Veauce in the northeast complete a site marked by its feudal history and modern transformations. The lithogravis of Edmond Tudot (1849) and the 19th century works testify to its heritage importance. Today, the castle combines historical preservation and openness to the public, with a tourist project centered on culture and nature.

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