Château de la Verrerie

The Château de la Verrerie is a château in Oizon, in the ancient province of Berry (now Cher) in France. It is an historic ancestral seat of a junior branch of the Scottish House of Stewart, known by the territorial title Seigneur d'Aubigny. It is situated about 14 miles south-east of Aubigny-sur-Nère, and the Château d'Aubigny, the original seat of its owners.

The estate was a dependency of the Seigneurie d'Aubigny-sur-Nère, which was granted in 1423 by King Charles VII of France to Sir John Stewart of Darnley, 1st Comte d'Évreux, 1st Seigneur de Concressault, 1st Seigneur d'Aubigny (c. 1380 – 1429) a Scottish nobleman and famous military commander who served as Constable of the Scottish Army in France, supporting the French against the English during the Hundred Years War. He was a fourth cousin of King James I of Scotland (reigned 1406 to 1437), the third monarch of the House of Stewart. La Verrerie was a demeure d'agrément, or secondary residence used for leisure activities, of the Seigneurs d'Aubigny.

The surviving structure, including the central corps de logis and chapel, was probably built between 1495-1500 by Bernard Stuart, 4th Seigneur d'Aubigny (d.1508) (Bérault, grandson of Sir John Stewart of Darnley), Captain of the Archers of the Scots Guards (an elite bodyguard of the French Kings) and Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom of Naples. The Gallery Wing with the two pavilions and the main entrance were added in about 1520-25 by his first-cousin once removed and son-in-law and successor Robert Stuart (d.1543), 4th Seigneur d'Aubigny, who married his daughter and heiress Anne Stewart.

In 1672, following the death of the last in the male line of the Stewarts of Aubigny, namely Charles Stewart, 3rd Duke of Richmond, 6th Duke of Lennox, 12th Seigneur d'Aubigny (1639-1672) (a fourth cousin of King Charles II), of Cobham Hall in Kent and of Richmond House in Whitehall, London, the estate escheated to the French crown, as ordained in the original deed of donation from King Charles VII.

In 1673, at the request of King Charles II of England, the Château de la Verrerie was granted by King Louis XIV to Louise de Kérouaille (1649-1734), the English king's last mistress. Also at Charles's request, in 1684 Louis XIV created her Duchesse d'Aubigny, a title in the Peerage of France.

Text adapted from “Château de la Verrerie (Cher)” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Château de la Verrerie ranks #3,313 of 8,133 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #249 of the 524 mapped in France. Founded c. 1450, it is older than 49% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 454 atlas entries founded in the 15th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 2,120 times in the last 60 days, more than 68% of the atlas. The nearest day-trip guide is Orléans, 71 km away. It is one of the 58 landmarks on the atlas's regional map of the Loire Valley. See how France compares in the castle statistics.

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