Bouillon Castle is a medieval castle in the town of Bouillon

Bouillon

Bouillon is a municipality in Belgium. It lies in the country's Walloon Region and Luxembourg Province.The municipality, which covers 149.09 km², had 5,477 inhabitants, giving a population density of 36.7 inhabitants per km².- History :...

 in the province of Luxembourg, Belgium

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

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Although it was mentioned first in 988, there has been a castle on the same site for a much longer time. The castle is situated on a rocky spur of land within a sharp bend of the Semois River

Semois

The Semois is a river flowing from the Ardennes uplands of Belgium and France towards the River Meuse, of which it is a right tributary....

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In 1082, Bouillon Castle was inherited by Godfrey of Bouillon

Godfrey of Bouillon

Godfrey of Bouillon was a medieval Frankish knight who was one of the leaders of the First Crusade from 1096 until his death. He was the Lord of Bouillon, from which he took his byname, from 1076 and the Duke of Lower Lorraine from 1087...

, who sold it to Otbert, Bishop of Liège in order to finance the First Crusade

First Crusade

The First Crusade was a military expedition by Western Christianity to regain the Holy Lands taken in the Muslim conquest of the Levant, ultimately resulting in the recapture of Jerusalem...

. The castle was later fitted for heavy artillery by Vauban

Vauban

Sébastien Le Prestre, Seigneur de Vauban and later Marquis de Vauban , commonly referred to as Vauban, was a Marshal of France and the foremost military engineer of his age, famed for his skill in both designing fortifications and breaking through them...

, Louis XIV's military architect in the late 17th century.