Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

Manoir de la Touche, also known as Manoir Jean V, is an urban residence built around 1420-1440 in Nantes, in the Loire-Atlantique department. Commanded by Bishop Jean de Malestroit as a summer residence, he included a manor house, an adorned well and the chapel Saint-Gabriel. This historic site is marked by the trial of Gilles de Rais in 1440 and the death of Duke Jean V of Brittany in 1442.

After serving as an episcopal residence, the mansion became a seminary for Irish priests from the seventeenth century until the Revolution. In the 19th century, Thomas Dobbrée, collector and patron, the remania by adding a cochère door, a staircase and a balcony. He set up his stables there before making it an exhibition space for the archaeological collections of the Société historique de Nantes in 1899.

The chapel of Saint-Gabriel, destroyed in 1866-1867, saw its gate and bentier preserved and integrated into the west gable of the mansion. The remaining stones were used to consolidate the adjacent well. The mansion, classified among historical monuments, illustrates medieval civil architecture and the transformations of the 19th and 20th centuries, linked to its museum use.

Today, the Manoir de la Touche hosts the temporary exhibitions of the Thomas Dobbrée departmental museum. Its history reflects the links between the episcopal power, the Breton aristocracy and the native cultural heritage, from the Middle Ages to the contemporary era.

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