Archaeological discoveries

Carolingian Laula of Doué-la-Fontaine


Doue-la-Fontaine is a commune in the department of Maine-et-Loire located southeast of Angers and southwest of Saumur. The territory has been occupied since the Neolithic era and is at the crossroads of several Roman roads, in particular the Angers-Poitiers road. In Carolingian times, Doué belonged to the kingdom of Aquitaine. The place is referred to as Thedwat or Theoadus, "the ford of the God" which may refer to a natural water passage or an ancient spring, known since antiquity. The region also has many washhouses.

Doue-la-Fontaine

Louis the Pious, born in 778, sixth child and fourth son of Charlemagne, has been king of Aquitaine since 781. According to the Annals Royales, the poem "Facts and gestures of Louis the Pious” of Ermold the Black (1) and the Life of Louis le Débonnaire written by the Anonymous said the Astronomer (2) , Louis learns of the death of his father Charles while he is at his palace in Doué-la-Fontaine.

This same text also tells us that King Louis has four winter residences in his kingdom of Aquitaine, where he goes alternately in order to be sure to have the necessary supplies for his men and himself. Among them is the Doué Palace.

He (Louis) decided that he would spend his winters in four different dwellings, so that at the end of three years he would successively choose to stay during the winter of the fourth one of these four dwellings, namely, Doué, Chasseneuil, Audiac, and Ebreuil. Thus each of these domains, when its year arrived, had enough to cover the royal expenditure. Life of Louis le Débonnaire, by the anonymous astronomer.

The Carolingian Aula

Description

In 1966, work was undertaken in the town to level a mound called "Motte de la Chapelle". A mechanical machine guts the mound and exposes traces of masonry. The site was immediately stopped and excavations began the following year. Led by Dean Michel de Boüard of the University of Caen, they lasted three years and brought to light a vast rectangular building measuring 23 meters by 17 meters. This building, classified as a Historic Monument on December 19, 1973, is known as the “Carolingian house” or “Carolingian aula” (3) .

This building has two doors. The main door, on the west facade, is about 3 meters high; the other, smaller, opens onto the south facade. Rectangular holes in the thickness of the wall, on either side of the doors, suggest that large beams could have been laid to barricade them.

The thickness of the walls varies between 1.72 meters and 1.80 meters. The device, very irregular, sometimes in small rubble stones, sometimes in larger blocks, sometimes in fishbone (opus spicatum) is characteristic of the early days of medieval construction.

The interior space is separated into two parts of unequal size by a shear wall 1.24 meters thick. The most spacious room (178 m² to the north) had a stone floor and a central hearth. The other room (72 m² to the south) had a fireplace. The back of this can still be seen through the south door:it is made up of bricks, then of tiles placed obliquely and finally of small cut stones. This room was probably a kitchen; this is what all the domestic waste found during the excavations suggests.

In order to ensure the supply of water, a well, still visible, is dug.

On the preserved plaster of the wall separating the kitchen from the aula, several later graffiti, dating from the end of the 10th – beginning of the 11th century, have been discovered. Made by a rather skilful draftsman, they represent rather complex scenes for graffiti, borrowed from the repertoire of painting or goldsmithing:thus are depicted a crucifixion, a virgin with child, characters.

Which building?

The Palace of Louis the Pious

The discovered structure does not correspond to the palace of Louis the Pious, because it was probably destroyed by the Vikings. Indeed, between the years 850 to 900, the region suffered numerous raids, which notably encouraged the inhabitants to take refuge in the caves and developed the troglodyte habitat in the region. This is particularly the case in Doué where the inhabitants have taken refuge in existing underground quarries (4) used by stonemasons to extract sarcophagi since Merovingian times.

On the Loire, the Viking chief Hásteinn was particularly rife, taking advantage of the dissensions between the sons of Louis the Pious and in particular the conflict between Charles the Bald (823, †877) and his nephew Pepin II (823, †864), about the kingdom of Aquitaine. In 845, Ancenis, Angers, Saumur, Chinon were looted. Angers was attacked again in 851 and 873.

The aula of Robert, Count of Poitou and King of Western France

The structure discovered corresponds rather to a construction carried out in the 900s for Count Robert, brother of King Eudes ( 860,♛888, †898) and future King of West Francia (866,♛922,†923). Indeed, in 853, Charles the Bald created a vast command composed of the territories of Anjou, Touraine, Maine and the Pays de Sées which he entrusted to Robert le Fort (815-830, †866), son of Count Robert III of Hesbaye. In 886, his son Eudes, Count of Paris, took over this command. Elected king in 888, he left this command and the county of Paris to his younger brother.

The construction therefore consists of a kitchen and a reception room, an "aula", a ceremonial room where the count received his faithful and where the main events in his public life. Traditionally, the "aula" is associated with a "camera", the count's private room and a "capella", a place dedicated to worship. The building was burnt down around the years 930-940. The traces of reddening on the internal faces of the walls suggest a disaster triggered by a war operation, which would have for context the quarrels between the counts of Anjou and the counts of Blois.

Indeed, in 853, Anjou and the Blois region were part of the command attributed to Robert the Strong and were governed in their name by viscounts. Little by little, while the Robertians acceded to the crown, the viscounts of Angers and Tours emancipated themselves. During the reign of Charles the Simple (879, †929), Foulque I of Anjou dit Foulques le Roux was called "Count of Anjou" while Thibaut I the Cheat (910, †977), took advantage of the death of 'Hugues le Grand (898, †956) to take the title of "Count of Blois".

The two lineages whose territories are strongly entangled then constantly compete, especially for the possession of the city of Tours.

The castle motte

Following this fire, the building was converted into a dungeon, by raising the walls. The doors were walled up and doors were opened, 5 meters higher. The building had a priori two levels. Wooden posts were planted in the ground to support the joists on which rested a floor separating the ground floor from the first floor. Finally, at the beginning of the 11th century, the base was sunk to a height of about 5 meters and the aula became a completely blind cellar. Also, Doué is the oldest example of the conversion of a primitive "aula" into a defensive work of the "castle mound" type.

The town of Doué depends on the lord of Saumur, Gelduin de Saumur, ally of the count of Blois, Eudes II ( 983, †1037). He opposes Foulques Nerra (965, †1040), Count of Anjou. This one, around 1023, launched a devastating raid on the region of Saumur. During this campaign which led to the capture of Saumur by Foulques in 1026, the town of Doué fell into the hands of the Count of Anjou. The keep would then have been destroyed, leaving only the motte remaining.

About the graffiti found on the coating of the shear wall, kitchen side, Michel de Boüard, in his article devoted to the study of these [ref5], hypothesizes that they were made by prisoners. During the capture of Saumur, Foulques Nerra captures the provost of the city, Aimeri, and several of his sons. Perhaps they were detained in the old kitchen of the aula, which became a cellar during the construction of the dungeon. Perhaps Aimeri was accompanied by his chaplain, hence the nature of the graffiti...

(1) Ermold the Black is an ecclesiastic, cleric of the house of Pepin I of Aquitaine. He was banished by King Louis the Pious for having incited his son Pepin I to revolt. As a refugee in Strasbourg, he wrote the poem "Facts and gestures of Louis the Pious" in order to win back the favor of the emperor.

(2) Nothing is known of this author, of whom no memory remains except for his works devoted to Louis the Pious.

(3] La motte is located south of Doué-la-Fontaine, at the corner of boulevard du Docteur Lionet and impasse de la Motte. It cannot be visited.

(4) The Cellars can be visited; they are located at 1, rue de la Croix Mordret.

Bibliography

- Life of Louis le Débonnaire, by the anonymous astronomer.
- Poem, "Facts and gestures of Louis the Pious", by Ermold le Noir
- Michel de Boüard, From the aula to the dungeon, the excavations of the mound of the Chapel at Doué-la-Fontaine (10th-11th century), in Medieval Archeology N° III-IV (1973-1974) , p. 5-110, Caen.
- Doué-La-Fontaine and its region, the Carolingian house, Doué-la-Fontaine Tourist Office.
- Michel de Boüard, The Carolingian graffiti of Doué-la -Fontaine (Maine-et-Loire), In:Reports of the meetings of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, 115th year, N. 2, 1971. pp. 236-251.
- Joëlle Delacroix, Hásteinn, Viking chief between myth and reality, December 4, 2013,