Maine-et-Loire is one of France’s most exceptional departments in terms of its castle heritage. The Loire Valley is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and its banks are dotted with an unbroken succession of castles, troglodyte dwellings and vineyards, making this region one of the most visited in France.
Saumur, whose white Gothic castle overlooks the town and the Loire from its rocky outcrop, is the department’s icon, its distinctive silhouette featuring in one of the illuminations of the Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry. Brissac, the tallest castle in France with its seven storeys, Montsoreau, Montreuil-Bellay, Le Plessis-Bourré with its moat and drawbridge… Masterpieces follow one another at a pace that rivals that of neighbouring Touraine.
Anjou was long the heart of a vast Atlantic empire over which the Plantagenets reigned: from England to Sicily, these Counts of Anjou ruled over a power that rivalled the French monarchy, and their architectural legacy continues to leave its mark on the department’s landscape.