Château de Vallery

The Château de Vallery is a Renaissance château in the commune of Vallery, in the Yonne department of Burgundy, France. Begun in 1548 for Jacques d'Albon de Saint-André, Marshal of France and a favourite of King Henry II, it was built by the royal architect Pierre Lescot on the site of a medieval fortress, of which the curtain walls, circular towers and cellars survive. Construction was left unfinished at Saint-André's death in 1562; only the west wing, the south wing and a corner pavilion were built.

In 1564 the estate passed to Louis I de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, and it remained a residence of the House of Condé until 1747, becoming a centre of Protestantism and the burial place of the Condé princes. From 1727 the estate belonged to Élisabeth Alexandrine de Bourbon-Condé, who demolished the south wing, and it was later held by the family of the Marquis de Sade.

Following demolitions and alterations in the 18th and 19th centuries and a period of decay in the 20th century, the château survives as one of the earliest examples of French Renaissance architecture, its design closely related to Lescot's contemporaneous work on the Louvre Palace. Its Renaissance gardens and orchard were listed as a monument historique in 1946, and the château and its dependencies in 2001.

Text adapted from “Château de Vallery” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Château de Vallery ranks #5,699 of 8,764 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #494 of the 675 mapped in France. Founded 1548, it is older than 42% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 827 atlas entries founded in the 16th century. 1 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Paris, 86 km away. See how France compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗