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The "Tour César "
("Caesar's Tower")
Built on the rocky outcrop
which constitutes the "Ville-Haute", the current tower (called
formerly, "Tower of the King", "Large Tower", "Turn with
prisoners"...) probably was built under the reign of "Henri le
Liberal" (1152-1183). However, an older tower, existing in 1137,
was named in the charter fixing the limits of
the Champagne
fairs.
This tower is built on an artificial mound and on the walls of
the fortifications which was the
keep. It was used as a jail, but its essential role was military:
Two covered ways were used to the surveillance on the plain of
Brie and surroundings. |
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It represents a square plan at its base,
becoming octagonal at its middle height, flanked of four turrets
being detached from the first covered way level.
The base of the building is wrapped by a heavy wall in
stonework, added by the English after their seat in 1432, known
under the scornful name of "Pâté aux Anglais".
The "Tour César" was surmounted by a terrace carrying a tower of
surveillance and a covered way with battlements. |
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Inside, at the
ground floor, a large arched room was used as
warehouse for the supplies.
At the higher floor, another room with same
dimensions but higher, called "salle des gardes"
(room of the guards), was the centre of
communication for all the tower.
From there, the stairs leave towards the low room,
the room of the governor and the covered ways. The
vault is perforated of a "hole for services", making
it possible to communicate with the last covered
way.
One reaches the dungeons by narrow corridors taken
in the thickness of the walls where the prisoners
were kept .
The tower was covered in 1554, and
the installation of the bells, coming from the
Saint Quiriace
Church 's turn-bell-tower broken down in 1689.
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Link
to "old postcards of the Tour Cesar" |
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