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Heritage classified

Origin and history

The castle of Sainte-Marthe was built between 1751 and 1754 on the site of an earlier dwelling. This monument illustrates 18th-century civil architecture, with a three-storey central body covered with a broken roof, flanked by two low wings with large croup roofs. The materials used, bricks for walls and stone for chains and decorations, reflect the construction techniques of the era.

The whole is completed in the east and west by communes, themselves finished by two pigeons, delimiting a courtyard closed by gates. The southern entrance, marked by a gable pediment pierced by a bay in the middle of the wall and framed with pilasters, forms the central element of the composition. The bays of the main building are in the middle of the hanger, while the bays of the lateral wings open under arches in basket handle. An attic, pierced alternately with egg-eyes and pediment-shaped dormers, crown the building.

Ranked a Historic Monument, the castle saw its facades and roofs protected by decree of 8 June 1978. This type of construction, typical of the aristocratic or bourgeois residences of the eighteenth century, bears witness to the taste for symmetry and balance, while integrating functional elements such as pigeons, symbols of seigneurial or agricultural autonomy.

The location of the castle, in the village of Sainte-Marthe in Lot-et-Garonne, is part of a territory marked by a rural and wine-growing history. At that time, castles often served as administrative or agricultural centres, reflecting local power and social organization around the major areas. Their architecture, both aesthetic and utility, met the needs of representation and land management.

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