Moncontour: The Ramparts of the Penthièvre, the Windows of Saint-Mathurin and the Chouans

Required Activities

• Walk out through the poterne Saint-Jean, the surviving gate of the 14th-century defences, then work round the outside of the town to the Tour Mognet and the stretches of 15th-century wall still standing, and work out from the ground how far the circuit once ran

• In Saint-Mathurin, find the three listed 16th-century windows — the life of Saint Barbara, the legend of Saint Yves and the Tree of Jesse — then pick out the window of the Pardon de la Saint-Mathurin and see whether you can tell from the glass alone that it is 19th-century work

• Work through the five rooms of the Maison de la Chouannerie et de la Révolution, in the same building as the tourist office, and find in Carolyne Morel's reconstructions the moment the town turned: in 1793 every district round Moncontour was full of chouans, and the roads out were cut

• Find the reliquary of Saint Mathurin's head in the church — the relics came here from Larchant and were hidden at Plessala through the Revolution — then walk out to the esplanade of the château des Granges, where the Pentecost pardon still ends after the reliquary has been touched to the animals to protect them

• Walk the upper town past the hôtel Veillet-Dufrêche, built for a linen merchant who ran a big cloth counting house, and the hôtel de Kerjégu and the hôtel de Clézieux, then go down to the Saint-Michel flour mill, the last of four that worked by that church in the 19th century