Lucheux
Encyclopedia
Lucheux is a commune
Communes of France
The commune is the lowest level of administrative division in the French Republic. French communes are roughly equivalent to incorporated municipalities or villages in the United States or Gemeinden in Germany...

 in the Somme
Somme
Somme is a department of France, located in the north of the country and named after the Somme river. It is part of the Picardy region of France....

 department in Picardie
Picardie
Picardy is one of the 27 regions of France. It is located in the northern part of France.-History:The historical province of Picardy stretched from north of Noyon to Calais, via the whole of the Somme department and the north of the Aisne department...

 in northern France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

.

Geography

Lucheux is situated on the D5 road, some 18 miles (29 km) southwest of Arras
Arras
Arras is the capital of the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France. The historic centre of the Artois region, its local speech is characterized as a Picard dialect...

, near the border with the neighbouring département of the Pas-de-Calais.

Population

style="font-weight: bold; font-size: 1.1em; margin-bottom: 0.5em"|Population history
1962 1968 1975 1982 1990 1999 2006
522 543 513 553 607 568 648
Starting in 1962: Population without duplicates

History

The château was taken by the Protestants under Captain Cocqueville in 1568 during the Wars of Religion
French Wars of Religion
The French Wars of Religion is the name given to a period of civil infighting and military operations, primarily fought between French Catholics and Protestants . The conflict involved the factional disputes between the aristocratic houses of France, such as the House of Bourbon and House of Guise...

.
Laid to siege and taken again in 1595 during the same wars, this time by the Spanish under Hernando Teillo de Porto Carrer.

Places of interest

Lucheux is a medieval town with many remarkable monuments:
  • The belfry
    Siege tower
    A siege tower is a specialized siege engine, constructed to protect assailants and ladders while approaching the defensive walls of a fortification. The tower was often rectangular with four wheels with its height roughly equal to that of the wall or sometimes higher to allow archers to stand on...

    , listed as an historic monument in 1896,
  • The fifteenth century château.

Dominating the town on the road leading north to Avesnes-le-Comte
Avesnes-le-Comte
Avesnes-le-Comte is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France.-Geography:A small farming town located 11 miles west of Arras at the junction of the D8, D75 and D339 roads.-Population:-Places of interest:...

), it presents an abrupt wall into the valley and the forest with the ruins of some round towers. The moat surrounding the fortress is preserved and can be visited. Some parts are overgrown and inaccessible. The vestiges of the round towers are hidden on their exterior face, but the entrance is well restored. The interior allows an understanding of the dimensions of the dwelling space available to the lord of the manor, with its walls and double bays of the Great Hall, below which one can see the
moat and a preserved section of the keep
Keep
A keep is a type of fortified tower built within castles during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars have debated the scope of the word keep, but usually consider it to refer to large towers in castles that were fortified residences, used as a refuge of last resort should the rest of the...

 or ‘donjon’.
  • The church, dating from the twelfth century.
  • An unusual hollow tree, known as the ‘marriage’ tree
  • Many restored typical Picardy
    Picardy
    This article is about the historical French province. For other uses, see Picardy .Picardy is a historical province of France, in the north of France...

    houses.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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