Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The water mill of Huisseau-sur-Mauves came into being in 1301, when a first mill was mentioned in Flit when the chapter of the church of Notre-Dame de Cléry was founded. Owned by the canons of Clery until 1790, it was sold as a national property after the chapter was abolished during the Revolution. This medieval mill, though transformed, marks the historical anchor of the site in the local milling activities, linked to the Church and the seigneury.

The present mill, rebuilt in the mid-19th century, illustrates the evolution of hydraulic and milling techniques. Its architecture combines a main building body, with to the south shelter of the Sagebien-type blade wheel (wood and metal) and its actuable valves from inside. The vertical transmission of movement, via toothed wheels, provided power to the grinding wheels and a shaft equipped with pulleys for auxiliary appliances (blutery, tarara). The whole reflects the mechanical innovations of the early twentieth century, integrated into a structure of the previous century.

The northern part of the mill was dedicated to housing, while in the east, an independent bread oven kept its own roof. A later building, added to the west, masked the original entrance, partially modifying the original layout. The site's listing as a Historic Monument in 1991 (including its mechanism, the furnace and the bay) underscores its heritage value, despite the exclusion of adventitious constructions. The mill thus symbolizes the transition between medieval seigneurial mills and rural industrial installations of the 19th and 20th centuries.

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