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Origin and history

The house of Ribérolles, located in Rivières in Charente, is mentioned as early as 1260 in a charter of the Count of Angoulême Hugues X le Brun, which grants the lords of the fief of Ribérolles the right of agland in the forest of the Braconne. This fief, dependent on the Barony of La Rochefoucauld and the County of Angoulême, was then located on the banks of the Tardoire. In the 14th and 15th centuries, the estate belonged to the Vigier family, then to the Raymond (or Raimond), squire and seigneuries of Ribérolles, until 1633, when it was sold to François de Guitard, squire and seigneur of La Borie and Villejoubert in Limousin.

The family of Guitard, allied with the Croizant (horsemen and lords of Rivières), preserves the estate from the 17th to the 20th century. In 1786, the central body of the current manor house and its right wing were completed, as indicated by the dates engraved on the frontons. The left wing was added in 1811. The estate, which extends over 13 hectares, includes a farmhouse and an imposing 15th century runaway, with a conical roof and ten rows of bolts. A 15th or 16th century door, decorated with a Gothic Renaissance arcade and the coat of arms of Guitard (a passing lamb), is preserved in the wall separating the castle from the farmhouse.

The manor house, a neoclassical style rare in the east of the Charente, consists of a central house body on one floor, flanked by two wings on the ground floor. Its interior preserves rocky woodwork, 18th-century ironworks, as well as chimneys and paintings added under the Restoration. After the death of the Baroness of Guitard in 1948, the estate moved to the family of Causans and was sold in the late 1980s. He changed ownership several times before being listed as a historic monument on March 12, 2010. Today private property, the house is not open to visit.

The estate's outbuildings, built in the mid-19th century, include barns, stables, sheds and three vaulted cellars. The restored 15th century dovecote and the medieval gate bear witness to the remains of the old castle. A slab of the church of Rivers also attests to the presence of the family of Riberolles before the eighteenth century. The mansion thus illustrates the architectural and seigneurial evolution of a charentais fief over nearly eight centuries.

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