The ramparts of Langres

Depart from the town of Langres, latitude 47.8588680 (N 47° 51’ 32”), longitude 5.3328430 (E 5° 19’ 58”)

• Porte des Moulins

• This door owes its name to the old mills that were outside the fortifications to take advantage of the wind (the "bel'air" that gave its name to the place). It is part of bastioned fortifications built between 1642 and 1647 south of the urban wall. The warrior decor evokes the victorious denouement that was then announced for France, engaged in the Thirty Years' War against Spain. Weapon trophies, plumed helmets and chained enemies make this gate a monument to the glory of the victories of royalty, a kind of triumphal gate evoking the distant Roman arches of triumph. Hammered at the Revolution, the coat of arms of the sovereign was also placed in the center of the pediment.
• Initially equipped with a carriage door framed by two pedestrian accesses, it was transformed in 1855 by the Military Engineering, which substituted two carters and removed the drawbridges.

• Red tower and door of the Auges

• Today simple advanced on the rampart, the Red Tower (on the right) was built in the middle of XIV^e century, during the integration of the southern suburbs in the urban enclosure. Justified by the beginnings of the Hundred Years War, these new fortifications gave Langres its definitive limits until the middle of the 20th century. Square plan, it was initially equipped with embrasures and topped with a roof. The original facing with bosses gives this tower the ocher hue that probably earned its name It was filled following the changes made to the ramparts in the mid-nineteenth century. From this time dates the door of the Auges which opened on the fortifications connecting the old city to the new citadel built in the south of 1842 to 1860. A lady - full turret placed on the top of the wall - forbade the journey of the enemy on the speaker.

• Tour Saint-Ferjeux

• This tower bears the name of a priory located on the current place Saint-Ferjeux and demolished in 1673. It replaced a first tower built in the middle of the fourteenth century; square and modest in size, it proved to be unsuited to the growing progress of the artillery. At the end of the 15th century, this work was leveled to make room for a new cylindrical artillery tower. First of this type to have been built at Langres, his party is radically different. The walls are very thick (up to six meters), the two vaulted rooms are equipped with eight casemates shooting and the summit terrace hosted large guns to protect the southern flank of the fortifications.
• This tower was restored in 1844 by the Military Engineer who rebuilt the parapet and modified the siding by replacing the defective bosses.
• Since 1989, the terrace has hosted a work by the Dutch sculptor Eugène Van Lamsweerde, entitled "The air and dreams", in tribute to the philosopher Champagne Gaston Bachelard.

• Michaux Tower

• This tower is part of the 14th century enclosure protecting the southern neighborhoods of the city. It was initially equipped with three superimposed rooms equipped with embrasures allowing the defense of the base of the fortifications. During the renovation of the ramparts in the middle of the 19th century, this work was completely transformed. The rooms were filled and the siding was completely taken over. Until that time, a covered gallery protected the walkway and watchmen from the weather; it was gradually dismantled between 1814 and 1847.

• Virot Tower

• This tower is at the junction between the urban wall and that of the Sub-Wall suburb. Built - or largely reworked - during the 1470s, it protected the door Henri-IV, which ensures the communication between the city and the suburb. Unlike the contemporary Saint-Ferjeux tower, its design does not seem to have benefited from technical input outside Langres. Thus, its fire openings were clumsily executed and its range of action was limited. At first, a roof covered with flat stones - lava - protected its terrace.

• Porte Henri iv

• This door leads to the district of Sous-Murs, devolved since the thirteenth century tanning activities of the skins. It is the only access east of the city as well as the most steep. Its openings, one cart, the other pedestrian, were both equipped with a moat and a drawbridge which remain housing the beams - the arrows - used to operate. A double door and a harrow completed the defense of this work. Until the Revolution, a statue of Henry IV straddling Pegasus - the mythological winged horse - decorated this door. A niche housing a Madonna with Child seems to ensure the integrity of the city against possible attackers. In 1846, the Military Engineering upgraded the defense of the gate and the neighborhood by making a defensive cut in front of Virot Tower.

• Spicy Tower

• This unusual name is due to the polygonal shape of this bastion, the first to have been built at Langres. Designed in the midst of the War of Religion instead of a medieval tower, this book is innovative; the artillery towers - such as the Saint-Ferjeux tower - are now too expensive compared to their efficiency. Around 1530, Italian engineers invent pentagonal structures which, filled with earth, are more economical and better able to dampen the impact of the balls. In the absence of vaulted rooms that have become too fragile in the face of artillery, cannons are now concentrated in the open air, at the top of earthworks.
• In 1850, the Military Engineering restored the watchtower to monitor the base of the book.

• Door Lanyard

• Until the middle of the 19th century the remains of a Gallo-Roman arc marking the northern limit of the city were still visible. Became a door after being included in the fortifications at the end of the third century, this work owes its name, either to its length, or to a legendary king called Longo whose effigy was on a console, city side.
• Around 1538, a barbican was built in front of the door to prohibit a frontal attack and deploy artillery pieces to flank the north wall. Designed as a kind of baffle lock, this structure had a first door equipped with a drawbridge. A new guardhouse completed this device in 1619.
• In 1851, the Military Engineering removed all ancient remains, lowered the parapet of the barbican, and installed a new drawbridge whose wheels are still visible.

• Saint John's Tower

• Contemporary of the barbican of Longe-Porte, this tower owes its name to the proximity of the former priory Saint-Gengoulph today disappeared. Installed on a rocky outcrop, this is the last artillery tower built at Langres. Its structure is simpler than its predecessors: its unique vaulted room with two side embrasures is protected by a frontal shield 7.5 meters thick.
• In 1883, a military dovecote in neo-medieval style was laid out on the terrace. Discreet and able to travel 100 kilometers in 80 minutes, the racing pigeons were used to transport messages until the eve of the First World War.

• Petit Sault Tower

• This U-shaped artillery tower with long flanks was intended to control the north-west corner of the enclosure and the Paris road passing at its feet. With its enormous embrasures and seven-meter-thick walls, its interior layout marries the slope of the terrain. The two rooms with powerful vaults are interconnected by a monumental staircase and support a vast terrace of artillery.
• The exterior cladding decorated with bosses and equipped with gargoyles enhances the relief and aesthetic appeal of the tower.
• Taking advantage of the work caused by the construction of such a building, the Town Hall obtained the digging of a public well initially provided with a coping.
• Naturally defended by steep slopes, this part of the enclosure did not require such an overabundance of means. A particularly skilful, impressive and oversized composition, this book depicts the military vocation of Langres at the beginning of the 16th century.

• Hotel-de-ville door

• This door located on a rocky spur appears consecutive to the closure of the Gallo-Roman arc nearby but with lesser defensive provisions. This change probably made during the early Middle Ages allowed better control of the path now located at the foot of the enclosure.
• Like most other langroises doors, the door of the Hotel de Ville was reinforced with a barbican in the sixteenth century. Built in 1620, the guardhouse is supported by massive consoles on the outside. Also for use as a grant, it bears witness to the commercial activity that animated this part of the city. As soon as this door was crossed, the market for pigs and the wheat market - the current squares of the Hôtel-de-Ville and Verdun - was directly accessible.
• The interior door was enlarged in the middle of the 18th century. The barbican and its drawbridge were restored a century later by the Military Engineering.

• Gallo-Roman door

• Built about thirty years after the conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar, this arch was the main gateway to Andematunnum - the ancient Langres - ​​on the west side. Oriented in such a way that the road coming from Reims penetrates directly into the city, it is the oldest preserved Langres building. Inadapted to effective defense, this arch was incorporated into the first fortifications at the end of the third century; his double access was probably condemned at the same time, in favor of the door of the Hotel de Ville. Because of its protruding angle on the enclosure, it was transformed into a covered tower, equipped with a body guard and embrasures of fire pierced in the frieze.
• Until the middle of the 19th century, a building leaned against the bow. Like the other parts of the enclosure, the Military Engineering expropriated definitively these houses during the works of restoration which occasioned the restoration of the cornice crowning the building.

• Tour Saint-Didier and Boulière gate

• The tower Saint-Didier remains the best preserved medieval fortified work at Langres. Its three superimposed rooms, its embrasures of shooting and its roof restored in the same way give a rather good image of what could be the other medieval towers now transformed or destroyed. It was essentially intended to defend the immediate surroundings of the Boulière gate with which it was a part. Under the Old Regime, the last floor served as a court for the four mass captains to judge crimes committed on the walkway.
• Created at the beginning of the 13th century, during the first extension of the walled enclosure to the south, the Boulière gate was protected from a triangular barbican in the 16th century. Building on the Saint-Didier tower and imposing a chicane entrance, it was equipped with a guardhouse and a corner watch tower. Its monumental door was decorated with an allegorical statue personifying the city of Langres as a young armed woman.
• Originally called "porte bovelière", this access seems to be due to the passage of the animals that went to the street of the same name and then to the Boucherie, where they were slaughtered and cut up.
• Transformed in 1854, the barbican fled permanently destroyed in 1906 to facilitate access to the door Terreaux nearby.

• Terreaux door or new door

• The construction of this gate is due to the Genie who wanted to avoid the military convoys crossing the city center. For this purpose, a bypass - currently boulevard De-Lattre - was built up to the Porte des Moulins.
• This double-ended door had a double drawbridge for crossing the ditch. Of the "Poncelet" type, from the name of its inventor, he maneuvered a heavy chain with links constituting the counterweight. As the bridge deck was raised, an increasing length of chain lay at the bottom of the pit and balanced the weights. Some of these developments are still visible.
• The coronation of machicolations adds a neo-medieval note to this work.

• Surchoue Tower

• This tower survives only by its trapezoidal shape, following its filling in the middle of the 19th century. Its name is reminiscent of the proximity of the old Surchoue Street, which in 1855 gave way to the current De Lattre Boulevard.
• Before 1412, the defense was ensured only by a work called chaffaud, a wooden construction crowning and overlooking the rampart. Its replacement by a tower required the use of stones from a quarry located south of the city, at a locality of Blanchefontaine. The roof was made of flat stones - or lava - brought from the village of Perrancey distant ten kilometers.

• Navarre Tower

• This work is located on a plot - the Navarre field; current campsite - having belonged to the counts of Champagne, also kings of Navarre. This is the most monumental artillery tower; its diameter of 28 meters, its height of 20 meters and its score of fire embrasures spread over four levels make it an extraordinary work. Its walls up to 7 meters thick protect two heavily vaulted and casemated rooms. The artillery from its terrace was to protect the plateau in front of the Porte des Moulins. Almost completed in 1515 after only four years of work, it was raised by 2.5 meters to increase the range of guns installed on its terrace. This transformation under construction led to the installation of a second level of gargoyles and the construction of a new tower - the Orval tower - protecting a spiral artillery ramp. It could route the guns to the top of the Navarre tower safe from enemy fire.
• In 1825, the Military Engineering turned this tower into a powder keg. A conical frame was then built to protect the lower rooms from infiltration.