HIDDEN FRANCE ❘ MORLAIX BAY
L
ocated in northwest Brittany, Morlaix Bay includes some of this corner of France’s most photogenic landscapes and heritage sites. It reaches east from Roscoff to Carantec, Plougasnou and Locquirec, and down inland towards the moors of the Arrée Mountains, Saint-Thégonnec and Guerlesquin. It encompasses remote, hushed hamlets, dazzling seaside resorts and historic town centres as well as Neolithic sites and châteaux, so there really is something for all tastes here.
THE RICHES OF HISTORY The town of Morlaix dates back 1,200 years to when a château and three abbeys were built where the River Queffl euth met the River Jarlot near the English Channel. Known to the Romans as ‘Mons Relaxus’ (‘restful mount’), the town’s economy truly began around 1110 AD when ship owners, weavers and a group of linen merchants joined forces and began the trade of weaving.
By the 1500s, the area around Morlaix was fi lled with crops of hemp to be transformed into linen fi bres, which were in turn woven into linen. The market for
56 ❘ FRANCE TODAY Aug/Sep 2022
BRITTANY’S ALCATRAZ
reinforced the fortress in granite, extending it to 60 metres to house 11 cannons, soldiers, two cells and facilities for rainwater collection. The work took 45 years to complete. In 1721, the fortress became a prison,
often for men whose families found them troublesome: they had them locked up and paid for their keep… once they stopped paying, the prisoner was released! The political prisoner Louis Blanqui was the fortress’s last inmate in 1871. The rest of Taureau’s history is rather more
The Château du Taureau casts an unmissable silhouette on the horizon as you gaze out to sea, and its history is fascinating. A fortress with a cannon was constructed on a rock here in 1542, perfectly placed to guard Morlaix from the English, who had pillaged and destroyed the town 20 years earlier. Around 1680, it underwent a radical
transformation thanks to Vauban, the military engineer appointed by King Louis XIV. Vauban
pleasant. Classed as an Historic Monument in 1914, it was rented to the Vilmorin family in 1930 who used it as a quirky summer home. Later, from 1960 to 1980 it was home to a sailing school. Finally, an association was created to save the fortress from falling into ruin and to open it to the public. Thanks to vast restoration work, it opened in 2006 and has been welcoming day-trippers into its cells and ramparts ever since, courtesy of regular boat trips.
chateaudutaureau.bzh
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