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In the northwest corner of the Cour d’Honneur, in the shadow of the Tour de Degré, is where the chapel stood.
‘Alice looked down. Two raised bronze lines on the ground marked out the site of where a building had once stood. There was a row of letters. She crouched down and read that this had been the site of the chapel of the Château Comtal. Nothing remained.’
From the courtyard you can enter the Musée Lapidaire – the museum of stones – on the first floor of what used to be the Château’s living quarters. Walk through the museum to the third chamber. This is the Donjon Room – council chamber – or Round Room, so called because of its barrel-shaped ceiling. The beautiful 12th-century murals were only uncovered in 1926.
‘Alice looked up in admiration at the cerulean blue ceiling, faded and cracked, but beautiful still. On the panel to her left, two chevaliers were fighting, the one dressed in black, holding a round shield, destined to fall for ever more under the other’s lance.’