Pays de Caux
Encyclopedia
The Pays de Caux is an area in Normandy
occupying the greater part of the French
département of Seine Maritime in Haute-Normandie
. It is a chalk
plateau
to the north of the Seine Estuary
and extending to the cliff
s on the English Channel
coast - its coastline is known as the Côte d'Albâtre
. In the east, it borders on the Pays de Bray where the strata
below the chalk show through.
Cauchois
is a notable dialect of the Norman language
. The Pays de Caux is one of the remaining strongholds of the Norman language outside the Cotentin.
The principal settlements are Le Havre
, Dieppe
, Fécamp
, Yvetot
and Étretat
.
caux means lime
, calcium carbonate
. In French
, for comparison, the word is chaux (the French 'ch' being pronounced as an English 'sh'. Example: Caux dialect candelle, English candle, French chandelle ). The name of the neighbouring Pays de Bray
comes from a Gaulish
word for mud. They appear to be so named as their soils distinguish them; the one of sticky clay, the other on dry chalk, but that is only a legend. In fact, according to something common in the former Gaul, the name derives from the Celtic tribe that lived here in ancient time: the Caletes (or Caleti. It means "the hard or the courageous people", Breton kaled hard, Welsh caled hard ) and this land was their territory. They are sometimes considered as Belgae
or as Armorican
s.
s in southern England. Its surface is an undulating plateau but the seaward side has been eroded by the waves so that the coast is formed of high white cliffs in which the small valleys which inland, form the undulations, are truncated leaving what are known locally as valleuse
s, steep-sided notches in the face of the cliff. They are more or less deeply cut and some form the sites of small towns such as Étretat. The formations left in the eroded cliff there have long attracted artists. See the photograph where Étretat lies to the right, in the valleuse beyond the first ridge.
The main towns in the north are on the coast, Fécamp
and Étretat
. Dieppe
, is towards the margin of the region, lying as it does on the same geological fault as formed the Pays de Bray. This fault gave rise to the deep harbour which the Northmen found when they arrived. (The Swedish for deep is djup.) The towns on the plateau are generally small. Of these, the larger, such as Yvetot
, Bolbec
and Lillebonne are towards the south, on the Rouen-Le Havre axis. The site of Le Havre
was once of the Pays de Caux but the town has developed into an entity with a separate nature.
The population density of the Pays de Caux is a little above the French average having developed fisheries, on the coast, and flax
growing and weaving, on the plateau, as traditional industries. The estuarine ports to the south developed trade up-river towards Rouen
and, once hostilities between the Normans and the French had been settled, with Paris
. In more recent times, urbanization has spread from Le Havre and more recently still, from the new industrial polder
in the Seine Estuary.
The plateau's exposure to the winds of the sea may account for one of the features of the rural architecture of the region; the plain, unadorned farmhouses in farmsteads, typically enclosed by high earth banks, walls and a sheltering square of trees. (see also Architecture of Normandy
).
’s account of his military campaigns (Bellum Gallicum, The Gallic War) gives details of the Caletes, partly ancestors of the Cauchois (see Book II, 4, 9, ; Book VII, 75, 3-4, Book VIII, 7, 4)
undertaken on the line of the A29 autoroute
revealed several Gallo-Roman villa
s. One of the most important is that of Sainte-Marguerite-sur-Mer, on the coast to the west of Dieppe. The archaeologists found a complex of several rooms, organised around a square court. Several of the rooms had been furnished with mosaic
s. To the north, the baths and other rooms were heated by hypocaust
s. The materials used were pisé (clay and grit well mixed and rammed down to form a wall), cob
(a similar mixture of earth of a buttery consistency or marl
, chopped straw and perhaps gravel) and timber framing
, typical materials of Normandy’s later building tradition.
Lillebonne is on the site of the main town of the Caletes, the Gaul
ish tribe of the region. The Gallo-Roman town was established with the name Juliobona, under Caesar Augustus and is famous for its Roman theatre
. According to a common use in Roman Gaul, the bona (Gaulish word for “foundation, town”) was dedicated to the Roman emperor
, like Augustodunum (Autun
), Augustonemetum (Clermont-Ferrand
) or Augustodurum (Bayeux
), etc. The phonetic evolution from the element Julio- to Lille- can be explained by the analogy with the French word for island : île, with the article agglutination l = the, that makes sense with the word bona > bonne, which means "good" in French, so "l'île bonne" = the good island. Their original main oppidum could have been Caudebec-en-Caux
or Fécamp
, according to the archeological excavations and the numerous Gaulish artefacts, that were discovered in both towns.
From the creation of the county of Rouen and of the Duchy of Normandy
in 911, the Viking
s settled a great number of people in the region and left an enduring legacy in the Cauchois dialect but also in the ethnic makeup of the Cauchois Normans.
) is in principle, the residence of a seigniorial lord though, in practice, the term now includes country houses of the gentry. As a rule, they are not fortified. Since the Hundred Years' War
, country houses have not had ramparts and towers. Artillery has rendered them obsolete. The peace and prosperity which were recovered following 1450, offered the option of reconstructing country houses and local materials such as flint
and limestone
were used. The owners could allow themselves to follow Renaissance style.
Most Norman manoirs have a dovecote
in the courtyard. A study by historians revealed 635 dove cotes in the three arrondissements of Dieppe, Le Havre and Rouen. Most are round and are permanent structures. The rarities are polygonal and timber-framed.
A few to be noted are:
and Gustave Courbet
to travel there to paint.
Normandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
occupying the greater part of the French
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...
département of Seine Maritime in Haute-Normandie
Haute-Normandie
Upper Normandy is one of the 27 regions of France. It was created in 1984 from two départements: Seine-Maritime and Eure, when Normandy was divided into Lower Normandy and Upper Normandy. This division continues to provoke controversy, and some continue to call for reuniting the two regions...
. It is a chalk
Chalk
Chalk is a soft, white, porous sedimentary rock, a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite. Calcite is calcium carbonate or CaCO3. It forms under reasonably deep marine conditions from the gradual accumulation of minute calcite plates shed from micro-organisms called coccolithophores....
plateau
Plateau
In geology and earth science, a plateau , also called a high plain or tableland, is an area of highland, usually consisting of relatively flat terrain. A highly eroded plateau is called a dissected plateau...
to the north of the Seine Estuary
Estuary
An estuary is a partly enclosed coastal body of water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea....
and extending to the cliff
Cliff
In geography and geology, a cliff is a significant vertical, or near vertical, rock exposure. Cliffs are formed as erosion landforms due to the processes of erosion and weathering that produce them. Cliffs are common on coasts, in mountainous areas, escarpments and along rivers. Cliffs are usually...
s on the English Channel
English Channel
The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...
coast - its coastline is known as the Côte d'Albâtre
Côte d'Albâtre
The Côte d'Albâtre is part of the French coast of the English Channel, corresponding to the coastline of Pays de Caux and forming almost all of the coastline of Seine-Maritime. Since 2009 it has been classified as a Natura 2000 site....
. In the east, it borders on the Pays de Bray where the strata
Stratum
In geology and related fields, a stratum is a layer of sedimentary rock or soil with internally consistent characteristics that distinguish it from other layers...
below the chalk show through.
Cauchois
Cauchois
Cauchois is one of the eastern dialects of the Norman language, spoken in, and taking its name from, the Pays de Caux region of the Seine-Maritime départment.-Status:...
is a notable dialect of the Norman language
Norman language
Norman is a Romance language and one of the Oïl languages. Norman can be classified as one of the northern Oïl languages along with Picard and Walloon...
. The Pays de Caux is one of the remaining strongholds of the Norman language outside the Cotentin.
The principal settlements are Le Havre
Le Havre
Le Havre is a city in the Seine-Maritime department of the Haute-Normandie region in France. It is situated in north-western France, on the right bank of the mouth of the river Seine on the English Channel. Le Havre is the most populous commune in the Haute-Normandie region, although the total...
, Dieppe
Dieppe, Seine-Maritime
Dieppe is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in France. In 1999, the population of the whole Dieppe urban area was 81,419.A port on the English Channel, famous for its scallops, and with a regular ferry service from the Gare Maritime to Newhaven in England, Dieppe also has a popular pebbled...
, Fécamp
Fécamp
Fécamp is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:Fécamp is situated in the valley of the river Valmont, at the heart of the Pays de Caux, on the Albaster Coast...
, Yvetot
Yvetot
Yvetot is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-History:The name is of Scandinavian origin . The town is most likely of Scandinavian origin too. There is also a locality in Bromölla municipality in southern Sweden bearing the same name...
and Étretat
Étretat
Étretat is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France. It is a tourist and farming town situated c. 32 km northeast of Le Havre, at the junction of the D940, D11 and D139 roads. It's located on the coast of the Pays de Caux area.-The...
.
Etymology
In the Norman languageNorman language
Norman is a Romance language and one of the Oïl languages. Norman can be classified as one of the northern Oïl languages along with Picard and Walloon...
caux means lime
Lime (mineral)
Lime is a general term for calcium-containing inorganic materials, in which carbonates, oxides and hydroxides predominate. Strictly speaking, lime is calcium oxide or calcium hydroxide. It is also the name for a single mineral of the CaO composition, occurring very rarely...
, calcium carbonate
Calcium carbonate
Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound with the formula CaCO3. It is a common substance found in rocks in all parts of the world, and is the main component of shells of marine organisms, snails, coal balls, pearls, and eggshells. Calcium carbonate is the active ingredient in agricultural lime,...
. In French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, for comparison, the word is chaux (the French 'ch' being pronounced as an English 'sh'. Example: Caux dialect candelle, English candle, French chandelle ). The name of the neighbouring Pays de Bray
Pays de Bray
The Pays de Bray is a small natural region of France situated to the north-east of Rouen, straddling the French départements of the Seine-Maritime and Oise...
comes from a Gaulish
Gaulish language
The Gaulish language is an extinct Celtic language that was spoken by the Gauls, a people who inhabited the region known as Gaul from the Iron Age through the Roman period...
word for mud. They appear to be so named as their soils distinguish them; the one of sticky clay, the other on dry chalk, but that is only a legend. In fact, according to something common in the former Gaul, the name derives from the Celtic tribe that lived here in ancient time: the Caletes (or Caleti. It means "the hard or the courageous people", Breton kaled hard, Welsh caled hard ) and this land was their territory. They are sometimes considered as Belgae
Belgae
The Belgae were a group of tribes living in northern Gaul, on the west bank of the Rhine, in the 3rd century BC, and later also in Britain, and possibly even Ireland...
or as Armorican
Armorican
Armorican may refer to the following:*Armorica, an ancient region of northwestern France*Armorican, another name for the Breton language*Armorican , a French breed of cattle...
s.
Geography
The Pays de Caux is a plateau of Upper Cretaceous chalk, like that which forms the North and South DownDownland
A downland is an area of open chalk hills. This term is especially used to describe the chalk countryside in southern England. Areas of downland are often referred to as Downs....
s in southern England. Its surface is an undulating plateau but the seaward side has been eroded by the waves so that the coast is formed of high white cliffs in which the small valleys which inland, form the undulations, are truncated leaving what are known locally as valleuse
Valleuse
In the Pays de Caux, Normandy, France a valleuse is a depression in the land surface of the plateau which permits access to the sea. On the rest of this coast, that access is prevented by the height of the chalk cliffs.There are three sorts:...
s, steep-sided notches in the face of the cliff. They are more or less deeply cut and some form the sites of small towns such as Étretat. The formations left in the eroded cliff there have long attracted artists. See the photograph where Étretat lies to the right, in the valleuse beyond the first ridge.
The main towns in the north are on the coast, Fécamp
Fécamp
Fécamp is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:Fécamp is situated in the valley of the river Valmont, at the heart of the Pays de Caux, on the Albaster Coast...
and Étretat
Étretat
Étretat is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France. It is a tourist and farming town situated c. 32 km northeast of Le Havre, at the junction of the D940, D11 and D139 roads. It's located on the coast of the Pays de Caux area.-The...
. Dieppe
Dieppe, Seine-Maritime
Dieppe is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in France. In 1999, the population of the whole Dieppe urban area was 81,419.A port on the English Channel, famous for its scallops, and with a regular ferry service from the Gare Maritime to Newhaven in England, Dieppe also has a popular pebbled...
, is towards the margin of the region, lying as it does on the same geological fault as formed the Pays de Bray. This fault gave rise to the deep harbour which the Northmen found when they arrived. (The Swedish for deep is djup.) The towns on the plateau are generally small. Of these, the larger, such as Yvetot
Yvetot
Yvetot is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-History:The name is of Scandinavian origin . The town is most likely of Scandinavian origin too. There is also a locality in Bromölla municipality in southern Sweden bearing the same name...
, Bolbec
Bolbec
Bolbec is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France. Its inhabitants are called Bolbécais or Bolbécaises.-Geography:...
and Lillebonne are towards the south, on the Rouen-Le Havre axis. The site of Le Havre
Le Havre
Le Havre is a city in the Seine-Maritime department of the Haute-Normandie region in France. It is situated in north-western France, on the right bank of the mouth of the river Seine on the English Channel. Le Havre is the most populous commune in the Haute-Normandie region, although the total...
was once of the Pays de Caux but the town has developed into an entity with a separate nature.
The population density of the Pays de Caux is a little above the French average having developed fisheries, on the coast, and flax
Flax
Flax is a member of the genus Linum in the family Linaceae. It is native to the region extending from the eastern Mediterranean to India and was probably first domesticated in the Fertile Crescent...
growing and weaving, on the plateau, as traditional industries. The estuarine ports to the south developed trade up-river towards Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
and, once hostilities between the Normans and the French had been settled, with Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
. In more recent times, urbanization has spread from Le Havre and more recently still, from the new industrial polder
Polder
A polder is a low-lying tract of land enclosed by embankments known as dikes, that forms an artificial hydrological entity, meaning it has no connection with outside water other than through manually-operated devices...
in the Seine Estuary.
The plateau's exposure to the winds of the sea may account for one of the features of the rural architecture of the region; the plain, unadorned farmhouses in farmsteads, typically enclosed by high earth banks, walls and a sheltering square of trees. (see also Architecture of Normandy
Architecture of Normandy
The architecture of Normandy spans a thousand years.- Vernacular domestic styles :In Haute-Normandie and in pays d'Auge, Mortainais, Passais and Avranchin , the vernacular domestic architecture is typically half-timbered and thatched....
).
Neighbouring natural regions
- Pays de BrayPays de BrayThe Pays de Bray is a small natural region of France situated to the north-east of Rouen, straddling the French départements of the Seine-Maritime and Oise...
to the East - Vexin normand to the South-east
- Lower SeineSeineThe Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...
valley to the South
Independent Gaul
Julius CaesarJulius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
’s account of his military campaigns (Bellum Gallicum, The Gallic War) gives details of the Caletes, partly ancestors of the Cauchois (see Book II, 4, 9, ; Book VII, 75, 3-4, Book VIII, 7, 4)
Roman Gaul
Rescue archaeologyRescue archaeology
Rescue archaeology, sometimes called "preventive" or "salvage" archaeology, is archaeological survey and excavation carried out in areas threatened by, or revealed by, construction or other development...
undertaken on the line of the A29 autoroute
Autoroutes of France
The Autoroute system in France consists largely of toll roads, except around large cities and in parts of the north. It is a network of worth of motorways. Autoroute destinations are shown in blue, while destinations reached through a combination of autoroutes are shown with an added autoroute logo...
revealed several Gallo-Roman villa
Roman villa
A Roman villa is a villa that was built or lived in during the Roman republic and the Roman Empire. A villa was originally a Roman country house built for the upper class...
s. One of the most important is that of Sainte-Marguerite-sur-Mer, on the coast to the west of Dieppe. The archaeologists found a complex of several rooms, organised around a square court. Several of the rooms had been furnished with mosaic
Mosaic
Mosaic is the art of creating images with an assemblage of small pieces of colored glass, stone, or other materials. It may be a technique of decorative art, an aspect of interior decoration, or of cultural and spiritual significance as in a cathedral...
s. To the north, the baths and other rooms were heated by hypocaust
Hypocaust
A hypocaust was an ancient Roman system of underfloor heating, used to heat houses with hot air. The word derives from the Ancient Greek hypo meaning "under" and caust-, meaning "burnt"...
s. The materials used were pisé (clay and grit well mixed and rammed down to form a wall), cob
Cob (building)
Cob or cobb or clom is a building material consisting of clay, sand, straw, water, and earth, similar to adobe. Cob is fireproof, resistant to seismic activity, and inexpensive...
(a similar mixture of earth of a buttery consistency or marl
Marl
Marl or marlstone is a calcium carbonate or lime-rich mud or mudstone which contains variable amounts of clays and aragonite. Marl was originally an old term loosely applied to a variety of materials, most of which occur as loose, earthy deposits consisting chiefly of an intimate mixture of clay...
, chopped straw and perhaps gravel) and timber framing
Timber framing
Timber framing , or half-timbering, also called in North America "post-and-beam" construction, is the method of creating structures using heavy squared off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden pegs . It is commonplace in large barns...
, typical materials of Normandy’s later building tradition.
Lillebonne is on the site of the main town of the Caletes, the Gaul
Gaul
Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...
ish tribe of the region. The Gallo-Roman town was established with the name Juliobona, under Caesar Augustus and is famous for its Roman theatre
Roman theatre (structure)
The characteristics of Roman to those of the earlier Greek theatres due in large part to its influence on the Roman triumvir Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus. Much of the architectural influence on the Romans came from the Greeks, and theatre structural design was no different from other buildings...
. According to a common use in Roman Gaul, the bona (Gaulish word for “foundation, town”) was dedicated to the Roman emperor
Roman Emperor
The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office although at any given time, a given title was associated with the emperor...
, like Augustodunum (Autun
Autun
Autun is a commune in the Saône-et-Loire department in Burgundy in eastern France. It was founded during the early Roman Empire as Augustodunum. Autun marks the easternmost extent of the Umayyad campaign in Europe.-Early history:...
), Augustonemetum (Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand is a city and commune of France, in the Auvergne region, with a population of 140,700 . Its metropolitan area had 409,558 inhabitants at the 1999 census. It is the prefecture of the Puy-de-Dôme department...
) or Augustodurum (Bayeux
Bayeux
Bayeux is a commune in the Calvados department in Normandy in northwestern France.Bayeux is the home of the Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts the events leading up to the Norman conquest of England.-Administration:Bayeux is a sub-prefecture of Calvados...
), etc. The phonetic evolution from the element Julio- to Lille- can be explained by the analogy with the French word for island : île, with the article agglutination l = the, that makes sense with the word bona > bonne, which means "good" in French, so "l'île bonne" = the good island. Their original main oppidum could have been Caudebec-en-Caux
Caudebec-en-Caux
Caudebec-en-Caux is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:Caudebec-en-Caux is located W.N.W. of Rouen, on the right bank of the River Seine. The tidal bore in the estuary of the Seine which is known as the mascaret in French, but...
or Fécamp
Fécamp
Fécamp is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:Fécamp is situated in the valley of the river Valmont, at the heart of the Pays de Caux, on the Albaster Coast...
, according to the archeological excavations and the numerous Gaulish artefacts, that were discovered in both towns.
Medieval
In the Merovingian period, the Pays de Caux became distinct from Talou: the ancient city of the Caletes separated into entities or ‘countries’ in the sense of the Latin pagus.From the creation of the county of Rouen and of the Duchy of Normandy
Duchy of Normandy
The Duchy of Normandy stems from various Danish, Norwegian, Hiberno-Norse, Orkney Viking and Anglo-Danish invasions of France in the 9th century...
in 911, the Viking
Viking
The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
s settled a great number of people in the region and left an enduring legacy in the Cauchois dialect but also in the ethnic makeup of the Cauchois Normans.
Manoirs and châteaux of the 15th and 16th centuries
A manoir (manor houseManor house
A manor house is a country house that historically formed the administrative centre of a manor, the lowest unit of territorial organisation in the feudal system in Europe. The term is applied to country houses that belonged to the gentry and other grand stately homes...
) is in principle, the residence of a seigniorial lord though, in practice, the term now includes country houses of the gentry. As a rule, they are not fortified. Since the Hundred Years' War
Hundred Years' War
The Hundred Years' War was a series of separate wars waged from 1337 to 1453 by the House of Valois and the House of Plantagenet, also known as the House of Anjou, for the French throne, which had become vacant upon the extinction of the senior Capetian line of French kings...
, country houses have not had ramparts and towers. Artillery has rendered them obsolete. The peace and prosperity which were recovered following 1450, offered the option of reconstructing country houses and local materials such as flint
Flint
Flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as a variety of chert. It occurs chiefly as nodules and masses in sedimentary rocks, such as chalks and limestones. Inside the nodule, flint is usually dark grey, black, green, white, or brown in colour, and...
and limestone
Limestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
were used. The owners could allow themselves to follow Renaissance style.
Most Norman manoirs have a dovecote
Dovecote
A dovecote or dovecot is a structure intended to house pigeons or doves. Dovecotes may be square or circular free-standing structures or built into the end of a house or barn. They generally contain pigeonholes for the birds to nest. Pigeons and doves were an important food source historically in...
in the courtyard. A study by historians revealed 635 dove cotes in the three arrondissements of Dieppe, Le Havre and Rouen. Most are round and are permanent structures. The rarities are polygonal and timber-framed.
A few to be noted are:
- Château d'Etelan, Saint-Maurice-d'Etelan, 1494
- Manoir de la Bouteillerie, Rouelles, Le Havre, 1531, dovecote of 1631
- Manoir Dubocage de Bléville, Dollemard, Le Havre, 1516
- Manoir d'Harquebosc, Harfleur-Beaulieu
- Manoir de Reauté, between Octeville and Montivilliers, takes its name from a family of the 16th century. Contemporary with Francis I of FranceFrancis I of FranceFrancis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
and Henry VIII of EnglandHenry VIII of EnglandHenry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
. - Château d'Epremesnil, Epremesnil, 1596, dovecote (note that the fief of Epremenil appears in the list of 1503 but the house, which was bombed in 1944 dates from the 19th century. (There must have been an earlier house and perhaps even a fief primitif (low Middle Ages) near the mill of Tauvais )
- Manoir du Grand Clos, 16th century.
- Manoir de Séntitot, Bévilliers, 1528 : manoir in brick and stone, with Renaissance sculpture. The fief of Bevilliers was held by Louis de Richebourg and Jehanne Viennens. In 1624, a Protestant chapel (called in France a temple) was built behind the house.
- Manoir du Petit col Moulins, 16th century, dovecote.
- Manoir de Vitanval, Sainte-Adresse, early 15th century, with a 16th century dovecote. It is a manoir of timber frame construction with a staircase in an external turret. In 1563, the constableConstableA constable is a person holding a particular office, most commonly in law enforcement. The office of constable can vary significantly in different jurisdictions.-Etymology:...
de Montmorency stayed there. - Manoir d'Estouteville, with loggiaLoggiaLoggia is the name given to an architectural feature, originally of Minoan design. They are often a gallery or corridor at ground level, sometimes higher, on the facade of a building and open to the air on one side, where it is supported by columns or pierced openings in the wall...
s, built in the 15th century by Guillaume d'Estouteville, archbishop of RouenArchbishop of RouenThe Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Rouen is an Archdiocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church in France. As one of the fifteen Archbishops of France, the ecclesiastical province of the archdiocese comprises the majority of Normandy....
in 1453.
The coast: la côte d'Albâtre
-
- Guy de MaupassantGuy de MaupassantHenri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was a popular 19th-century French writer, considered one of the fathers of the modern short story and one of the form's finest exponents....
, Le saut du berger (The Shepherd’s Leap). Originally published in Gil Blas of 9 March 1882 :
- Guy de Maupassant
«From Dieppe to Le Havre the coast presents an uninterrupted cliff, about a hundred metres high and straight as a wall. Here and there that great line of white rocks drops sharply and a little, narrow valley, with steep slopes, shaved turf and maritime rushes, comes down from the cultivated plateau towards a beach of shingle where it ends with a ravine like the bed of a torrent. Nature has made these valleys; the rains of storms have ended with them in the shape of these ravines, trimming what was left of the cliff, excavating down to the sea, the bed of waters which acts as a passage for mankind. Sometimes, a village is snuggled into these valleys, where the wind of the open sea is devoured.»
-
- Guy de Maupassant, Pierre et Jean, chapter 6 :
«The cool air, where the smell of the coast and of the gorse, the clover and the grasses, the briny scent of the uncovered rocks, stirred him still as it gently intoxicated him and he made his mind up, a little at each step, each second, each glance thrown at the alert outline of the young woman; he decided not to hesitate in telling her that he loved her and that he wanted to marry her. He would use the peach to induce their tête-à-tête; and besides, it would be a pretty frame, a pretty place for speaking of love, feet in a pool, of limpid water, watching as the long beards of the shrimps fled under the bladder-wrack. When they reached the end of the little valley on the edge of the abyss, they noticed a little path which went down along the cliff, and below them, between the sea and the foot of the mountain, about half way up the slope, a surprising chaos of huge rocks, collapsed, turned upside down, piled together, one on another in a sort of turbulent grassy plain which ran as far as the eye could see towards the south, formed by old landslides. On that long strip of undergrowth and shaken turf, one might have said by the stirring of a volcano, the fallen rocks looked like the ruins of a great vanished city which once looked out onto the ocean, itself dominated by the white, endless wall of the cliff.»
Inland: the plateau
- Guy de Maupassant admirably describes the rural feeling of the Pays de Caux in his novels.
- For example: drawn from Miss Harriet, published in Le Gaulois of 9 July 1883, under the title Miss Hastings, then, in the compendium Miss Harriet; Maupassant describes a journey by public coach from Etretat to Tancarville:
« It was Autumn. From the two sides of the way the stripped fields extended, yellowed by the short stubble of the harvested oats and wheat which covered the ground like an ill-shaven beard. The misty land seemed to be smoking. The skylarks were singing in the air, other birds piped in the bushes. The sun finally rose before us, all red on the edge of the horizon; and as it climbed, lighter from minute to minute, the countryside seemed to be waking, to smile, shake itself and throw off, like a girl rising from her bed, its shift of white vapour. The Comte d'Etraille, on the seat, cried; "Look, a hare" pointing to the left towards a patch of clover. The animal darted away, almost hidden in the field, showing only its long ears; then it bolted over some plough-land, stopped, set off again in a mad race, changed direction, stopped again, troubled, listening for any danger, undecided which way to go; then started to run again with big bounds of his hindquarters, and he disappeared in a wide square of beet. All the men marvelled, following the creature's progress and gait. »
Artistic connections
The rugged scenery of the Pays de Caux, within a comparatively short distance from Paris, encouraged artists, including Claude MonetClaude Monet
Claude Monet was a founder of French impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. . Retrieved 6 January 2007...
and Gustave Courbet
Gustave Courbet
Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet was a French painter who led the Realist movement in 19th-century French painting. The Realist movement bridged the Romantic movement , with the Barbizon School and the Impressionists...
to travel there to paint.