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Origin and history

The feudal motte of Loubert is a castral motte located in the former commune of Loubert, now integrated into Terres-de-Haute-Charente (Charente, Nouvelle-Aquitaine). This site, mentioned from the 10th century, occupied a strategic position at the junction of the dioceses of Angoulême, Limoges and Poitiers. It controlled a ford or bridge over the Charente, close to the Charroux-Perigueux Roman Way, and was a key point for exchanges between the Charente and Vienna valleys.

Originally, the motte housed a wooden tower, replaced in the 13th century by a stone tower built by the lords of Chabanais, Confolens and Loubert. This tower, which disappeared around 1570 during the Wars of Religion, was excavated on the moth to lean on a rocky base. The remains of a square dungeon (7.50 m x 6.50 m) and granite basements, discovered in the 19th century, were demolished around 1860. No significant architectural element remains today.

The site was protected by a castrum including a Romanesque church built at the end of the 11th century, itself surrounded by a second enclosure. The moth, about fifteen metres high and about twenty, was surrounded by a hemicircular ditch in the north and east. To the south, a hollow road led to a medieval bridge on the Charente, possibly subject to toll. A vaulted low hall, dug in the rock to the west, would have served as armory for archers.

Loubert was first quoted between 1032 and 1070 in a charter of the Abbey of Lesterps, under the seigneury of the Jordan of Chabanais. Initially chestnut in the 16th century, the estate became an independent barony in the 17th century, owned by the Salignac-Fenelon until the Revolution. The excavations and observations of the 19th century, notably by André Rempnoulx du Vignaud, partially documented its history before the last remains disappeared.

Today, Loubert's moto is more than a truncated tertre, a silent witness to the feudal dynamics and religious conflicts that marked the Limousin Charente. Its location, close to the church and the former Manot Road, recalls its central role in the region's territorial and military organization between the 10th and 17th centuries.

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