The bastioned wall of Tours was a rampart constructed between 1591 and 1685 around the modern city of Tours.
The project originated in the early 16th century under the reign of Francis I, in response to the city's expansion beyond its medieval walls. It was formalized during the Wars of Religion, when Henry III took refuge in Tours for security reasons. Construction began with the approval of Henry IV but progressed slowly over nearly a century. The final structure was less extensive than originally planned, due to financial constraints. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the enclosure was breached in several locations to accommodate urban developments, including the construction of roads, a canal, and a railway station. These modifications contributed to the city's vulnerability to flooding by the Loire River in the mid-19th century. The rampart, having lost its military and hydraulic functions, was gradually neglected and fell into disuse.
The enclosure was gradually dismantled or incorporated into new structures, with only a few remnants surviving, primarily in its western section. Its layout continues to influence the urban landscape, notably along the southern flank, where Boulevards and Heurteloup were constructed on terraces adjacent to the former wall. The bastioned rampart of Tours was included in the General inventory of cultural heritage in 1991.
Geographical and historical context
Aborted projects In 1476, approximately a century after the clouaison was built under John the Good, discussions began regarding the expansion of the city. In 1478, Louis XI initiated a project to reclaim land from the south bank of the Loire River to an island midstream, aiming to redirect the river northward. The plan was abandoned in 1481 due to its impractical scale and persistent adverse weather conditions.
Around 1520, Francis I and his Superintendent of Finances, Jacques de Beaune, proposed expanding Tours by draining the marshy varenne south of John the Good's wall and constructing a new enclosure. Despite the city's prosperity, financial constraints limited the project, and only minor works were completed at the eastern and western ends of the city.
Origins
In the late 16th century, during the Wars of Religion, Henry III sought refuge in Tours, prompting Jean VI d'Aumont to propose a new defensive wall. By this time, Tours had expanded beyond its 14th-century wall, particularly westward, as depicted in a 1572 bird's-eye view. A new enclosure was planned to protect the city from the in the west to Saint-Pierre-des-Corps in the east. Jacques Androuet du Cerceau designed the final plan after an earlier proposal by Gilles de Courtenvaux de Souvré, , was deemed inadequate; the eastern bastion was named after Souvré. The plan was authorized by Henry IV through letters patent in April 1591.
The city's economic condition, weakened by debt, hindered the rapid construction of the new wall compared to earlier in the century. Despite this, the king committed to funding "14 écus and 40 sols per toise of wall," provided the mayor and aldermen of Tours contributed matching funds from octroi collections. With the Wars of Religion less pressing, the urgency for the project decreased.
Construction over time
In 1599, the city council scaled back the project, adopting a less extensive plan, particularly reducing the western perimeter of the wall. Construction, overseen by Jacques Androuet du Cerceau and French-naturalized engineer Richard Barthélemy, progressed slowly. Significant work on the enclosure began in 1616 and was completed in 1685, with interruptions, including one ordered by Louis XIII between 1626 and 1635. Priority was given to digging southern moats and reinforcing the Loire-facing section to protect against flooding. The city allocated construction contracts through public bidding, dividing the work into sections.
During the construction of the enclosure, the city's militia system was reorganized. In 1663, thirteen guard companies were established, with four assigned to protect the rampart's main gates and the others deployed around the old wall or beyond the city limits.
A wall far exceeding the urbanized area The new wall, spanning 6 km, doubled the city's area to 168 hectares, including bastions, and enclosed extensive gardens to the south and east for future urban expansion, while part of the La Riche suburb to the west remained outside. Like Jean le Bon's clouaison, it extended west to east along the Loire River, with its southern boundary aligning with the modern Heurteloup and Béranger boulevards, connecting to the Loire via present-day rue Léon-Boyer in the west and avenue Georges-Pompidou in the east. After 1788, a Protestant cemetery, previously located at the Bastion des Oiseaux, was relocated outside the walls, as noted on 1873 map of Tours. Despite a reduced perimeter following plan revisions, full urbanization of the enclosed area occurred only in the 19th century, with the southeast neighborhoods developed last.
A defined defensive purpose
Curtain wall The wall, approximately 8 meters tall up to a molded string course, features a parapet with casemates and embrasures, reaching a total height of nearly 10 meters. Plans for multiple bastions along the southern flank, as shown in René Siette's 1619 map, were abandoned during construction. Instead of bastions, simple turrets were integrated into the curtain wall, as depicted in a wash painting from the 1680s.
An excavation in 1991 at Place du Général-Leclerc revealed that the retaining wall of a bastion defending the Saint-Étienne gate is supported by piles driven into the ground or a platform of beams. The wall, constructed with two faces of medium-sized yellow tuffeau stone blocks from Saint-Avertin, has a rubble masonry core of tuffeau blocks, with a total thickness of 2.4 meters at ground level. The outer face features a pronounced batter. Since construction, the ground level has risen by approximately 4 meters.
Gates and ditch
The bastioned wall originally featured four main gates—Sainte-Anne (or des Oiseaux) in the west, Saint-Éloi at the southwest corner, Saint-Étienne near the train station, and Henri de Bourbon on the eastern side along the Loire—each defended by bastions with orillons. Their locations were aligned with the existing road network. Additional gates and posterns were situated along the Loire-facing side.
A dry ditch, serving as the first line of defense, surrounded the bastioned wall's perimeter, except along the Loire River. Earth excavated from the ditch was used to elevate the ground level within the bastions. Between the Bourbon and Saint-Éloi gates, the Dolve stream, also known as the "encircling stream" (names recorded after the wall's construction), was incorporated into the ditch. This stream helped drain moisture from the marshy area containing oxbow lakes and channeled some of the city's sewage. From the mid-19th century, the heavily silted stream, with stagnant water causing local complaints, was filled in or culverted along its entire length.
Functional structures to the North and decorative features to the South
Dikes and landing stage on the Loire
The wall along the Loire River extends the left bank approximately 15 meters northward, continuing efforts to reclaim land from the river since the city's founding. It incorporated the clouaison of Jean le Bon, whose remnants were later leveled and buried under fill supporting the new wall between the medieval bridge and the northwestern corner. Posterns on the north side were designed to mitigate flooding. A landing stage at the northern end of rue Raguenau was framed by two recessed segments of the curtain wall, visible in Claes Jansz Visscher’s 1625 engraving, and supported by oak piles driven into the ground, creating a 31-meter-wide opening. In 1692, a triumphal arch honoring Louis XVI was built along the Loire front but was dismantled in 1755 to facilitate the construction of rue Nationale and the Wilson Bridge.
Tree-lined promenade along the ramparts In 1603, a promenade lined with two double rows of elm trees, some transplanted from other parts of Tours, was established along the southern curtain wall, forming the basis for the future boulevards Heurteloup (east of the train station, known as Petit Mail) and Béranger (including the western section of boulevard Heurteloup, known as Grand Mail). This promenade became a popular Sunday destination for residents. The elm trees were periodically replanted, though in 1793, those in the Petit Mail were cut down to supply timber for the National Navy.
A wall of questionable usefulness
A defensive role quickly abandoned
The bastioned wall, completed in the late 17th century, proved militarily obsolete due to improved security conditions, facing no significant threats. By 1604, mulberry trees were planted within a bastion, and by 1722, bastions and ditches were used for gardens or pastures, indicating a loss of defensive purpose. In 1724, Louis XV ordered the curtain wall's height reduced. Between 1754 and 1758, the Saint-Étienne gate was closed using reused masonry, though its bastions remained until the train station's construction. The opening of the chaussée de Grammont (now ) and a new passage at Place Jean-Jaurès in 1751, followed by the development of (1764), the (1765–1778), and rue Du Cluzel (later rue Nationale, 1775–1786), formed a major north-south road axis, likely planned by Daniel-Charles Trudaine around 1747 to establish a new route to Spain via Tours.
By the mid-18th century, the city no longer viewed the wall as a defensive structure, repairing the curtain wall only when its deterioration threatened public amenities and demolishing sections considered too costly to maintain. Private landowners similarly dismantled parts on their properties, with municipal authorities readily approving such actions.
Insufficiently effective flood protection
The bastioned wall was initially intended to protect Tours from Loire River flooding, but its effectiveness was compromised by significant breaches. Between 1775 and 1786, the construction of Rue Nationale created two large gates on the north and south sides. To mitigate flood risks, the southern passageway at Place des Portes de fer (now ) was raised into a humpback shape using rampart debris, though it was obstructed by octroi gates. The , constructed between 1824 and 1828, demolished the eastern section of the rampart, including the Henri de Bourbon gate, with its masonry repurposed for the canal levee. The construction of the first railway station in 1845 further demolished parts of the curtain wall near the former Saint-Étienne gate. These breaches left Tours vulnerable to flooding from the alluvial plain between the Loire and Cher rivers, exacerbating damage during the major floods of 1846 and 1856. The remaining wall hindered the rapid drainage of accumulated floodwater, worsening the impact.
Disappearance in the mid-19th century By the mid-19th century, the rampart remained largely intact, but its condition deteriorated rapidly thereafter. In 1861, the crumbling and vegetation-covered curtain wall was reduced to approximately 2.5 meters in height along its entire length, and the tree-lined promenades (mails) were transformed into boulevards. Demolition materials were used to backfill the land at the rampart's base. The Dolve stream was eliminated, and the humpback rise at Place des Portes de fer was leveled to accommodate tram tracks introduced in 1877.
Imprint on the urban landscape