Thursday, June 14, 2018

Aigues-Mortes

Walled city from the 12th Century.  You can walk the ramparts which I found to be most satisfying. The south and east walls are clear and west wall not too encumbered.  The more critical north wall now has a car park in front and some tall plane trees.  This means the additional defensive structures have long gone.  This also applies to the wooden defensive structures that would have topped the city walls.

The tower is amazing.

The city was built as the French kingdom's first port on the Mediterranean and as such a few crusades left from here.  However it silted up in a hundred years and more critically became redundant when Provence and its port of Marseilles became part of France.  However it still served as a military base and sanctuary after that.

Looking north along the west wall to the Constance Tower.
There is a canal that runs past the west wall,
which if I understand correctly,
gave the port access to the sea.

The south wall

Looking west along the south wall

Looking north west towards the Constance Tower.

The east wall in the distance

South east corner tower

On the east wall there were lots of pock marks on the towers, 
as if they had been used for target practice.

Looking south along the east wall

The north wall. As the area at most risk of attack, 
there were other defence works here, 
but now covered by the car park and trees.

View north from the Constance Tower. 
There is another water feature I failed to capture in the picture, 
on the immediate left hand side

Another view from the Constance Tower, 
along the north wall looking east.

And that is the tour bus pulling into the pick up bay and the start of my mad dash back. 
Luckily I met no one coming up the spiral staircase during my descent, 
or at least I don't think I did.

7 comments:

  1. Very interesting French Fortifications - lots of modelling ideas there. I lost all my photos from England, Wales, Scotland and Europe -with a computer melt down...suggest downloading all your pix onto a USB stick as a precaution. Thanks for the Tour Gide. Cheers. KEV.

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    1. Thanks.

      In part publishing the photos on my blog puts them safely in Goggle's hands. I also backup photos across various family members' computers and other selected social media sites. But it takes a bit of coordination.

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  2. Amazing. Thanks for posting this. Thinking of adding a castle to the next zombie game I play.

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    1. Thanks. One site we visited was church that had been converted to be used a prison in Napoleonic times and is only recently being converted back into a more hospitable place. There were some tunnels and things and it would make a great zombie setting as I am sure there was a well used graveyard there, populated by various victims over the centuries.

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    2. Excellent idea. Zombies from the 14th to 20th centuries. How do you kill a zombie wearing chain mail! :) Although with wear and tear and the weight of the armour they may go a bit slower.

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