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Vauluisant

In 1127, Abbot Norpaud and 12 monks came from Preuilly abbey to the valley of river Alain and built up a new abbey: Vauluisant (vallis lucens). In 1144, thanks to the generosity of Louis VII, Thibaut de Champagne and the neighboring lords, Archbishop Hugues de Toucy could devote the churh, built according to the recent rules of Gothic architecture. Vauluisant reached its peak of influence in the 13th century and had spread to the new abbey of Varennes in 1149. After the Hundred Years War of looting and disorder, the abbey enjoyed a period of renewal. In the 16th century, Abbot Antoine Pierre transforms the medieval abbey into a Renaissance structure. Lay administration of Vauluisant started with Odet de Coligny and ended with the French Revolution when the abbey was sold as a national property. In the early nineteenth, a buyer, willing to make a quarry out of it, had the abbey partly demolished. Leopold Javal, industrial and deputy of Yonne district, new owner in 1835, transformed Vauluisant into a model farm. In 1945, the new heir, Jean Gamby, gives Vauluisant its current appearance. You can still visit the Notre Dame gatehouse , the guesthouse , St Madeleine chapel , the dovecote with a medieval garden next to it , the mill , St Thomas door , Mathilde summerhouse , François I dependencies , the tith barn . The Converts building, partly reshaped, now is the castle with a monumental staircase built by Franque in 1739. The park is classified as ?archeological reserves?