La forteresse des Ducs de Guise

Guise, a bolt on the Oise valley, owes it to its position to have been, from the tenth to the twentieth century, a fortress at the heart of European events. To the imposing medieval fortified castle dominated by the keep, the famous Dukes of Guise added in the sixteenth century one of the largest bastioned strongholds of northern Europe. Its astonishing modernity earned it the attention of Vauban. After a thousand years of history, bombed during the First World War, ruined, looted, the château and its last remains nearly disappeared under a rubbish dump. In 1952, Maurice Duton, a young man from Guise, founded the Club du Vieux Manoir, a youth movement offering useful, concrete activities in the service of young people and heritage. Since then, rescue, animation and restoration activities have brought the site back to life, where each year young volunteers succeed one another.

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