THE CURSED LOVERS OF RAVALET CASTLE
Cherbourg
Avenue du château / Tourlaville
Game of Thrones doesn't have the monopoly on incest! Château des Ravalet was home to a few licentious liaisons between a brother and sister from an aristocratic family. Was it the romantic ambiance of this Renaissance-era castle that pushed Marguerite into the arms of Julien, or perhaps the pretty blue shale exterior? History doesn't say. What we do know is that both were beheaded in 1603, at Place de Grève in Paris, marking a dramatic end to their illicit affair. The scandal has inspired more than one writer. In 2015, Valérie Donzelli's film Marguerite et Julien was featured at Cannes. Almost a century earlier, Tancrède Martel penned the tale of the couple's passion. In his book Julien et Marguerite de Ravalet (1582-1603), published in 1920, the author refers to a heart pierced by an arrow lodged in the staircase of Aubigny stone, inside the Quatre-Vents tower. Four centuries later, visitors can still see this marking, a last – and lasting – testament to the siblings' love.
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