Perigordian Bastides

When the brother of King Louis IX (who was canonised for mounting a Crusade), Alphonse de Poitiers, became Count of Toulouse, the first series of bastides were formed along the valley of the Dropt river. Castillones (Lot & Garonne), Eymet, Monflanquin(Lot & Garonne), Villefranche-du-Perigord (Dordogne) and Villereal(Lot & Garonne) were established therefore between 1256 and 1270. English king Henry III founded the bastide of Lalinde (Dordogne) and Edward I built Beaumont, Molieres and Monpazier (all Dordogne).

The Bastides of the Perigord occupy a narrow strip of territory that lies between the valleys of the Dordogne to the north and the Dropt to the south. The area is crossed by country roads that cut across the wide, open plateaux, or lose themselves in a confusion of zig-zags in the damp, wooded valley bottoms.

Bastides are small fortified towns founded generally upon a hilltop, a plateau or a rocky spur. The walls put up around the town were built in order to protect the town from armed assault or even bandits!

Built around market squares which were both their centres and their symbols, the bastides were exchange markets and production points.