AT A GLANCE
Why go?
The Porte de Libourne — also known as the Tour du Grand Port — is the most imposing surviving fragment of the medieval walls that once encircled the bastide town of Libourne. Built between 1281 and 1341 under the English crown of Edward III, this fortified gate guarded the busiest entrance to the town: the water gate onto the river Isle, which served as Libourne's working harbor for centuries.↗↗
Today, standing on the open esplanade beside the Isle, visitors can read six hundred years of military and civic history in the stonework: twin round towers with machicolations, murder holes, arrow-slits, and the grooves where a portcullis once slid shut. The taller tower wears a distinctive conical slate roof that was added in the sixteenth century, giving it the silhouette most associated with Libourne's skyline.↗
A Gate Born of English Aquitaine
Libourne was a bastide — a planned new town — founded during the centuries when the kings of England held the duchy of Aquitaine. Its defensive walls were begun in 1281 and completed in 1341, a span that covers the early decades of the Hundred Years' War. Nine gates pierced the curtain wall, five of which opened onto the banks of the river Isle, underscoring how vital the waterborne trade was to the town's economy. The Grand Port gate, facing the active harbor, was among the most important of these access points, second only to the Porte de Saint-Émilion on the landward side.
