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Founded: c. 1180Category: Castles and fortifications in France
Historical period: Late Capetians (France)
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Château de Saint-Jean-d'Angle was probably built in the 12th century, probably by Guillaume de Lusignan who belonged to one of the most powerful families of the Poitou region. From 1406 to the 17th century, the castle remained in the hands of the Saint-Gelais family, a younger branch of the de Lusignan family. The residence adjoining the original rampart dates back to the Renaissance.
In 1994, Alain Rousselot, a businessman from La Rochelle bought the site with the intention of saving it. Today it is open to the public and hosts a medieval theme park.
The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.