An inventory of works within the city walls - Besançon

Villes et Pays d’art et d’histoire
Besançon
a story in stone
An inventory of works
within the city walls
From Vauban to the start of the 19 th century

A natural stronghold
Besançon, from its earliest history, has made the most of
its natural advantages:
- an exceptional defensive site: a loop formed by
a meander in the Doubs, closed off by a hill (the location
of the citadel). The site had space for housing and could be
easily defended as it is closed off by the citadel rock
(the loop was occupied from the Bronze Age,
around 1500 B.C., by Gallic tribes)
- A crossroads location between the Rhine and Rhone
regions and between northern Italy and the Seine.
The geographical constraints therefore dictated the
conditions for the establishment of the town.
A military stronghold, political centre and religious capital,
the fortifications, erected at every great period in its history,
have shaped the current urban landscape.

Vauban and Besançon
Vauban made best possible use of
the natural defences of the Besançon
site, with the citadel, the masterpiece
among all the defence works at the
narrowest and highest point,
the right-bank enclosure with Fort
Griffon, bastions and demi-lunes
(ravelins) and an innovative system
on the left bank, taking into account
the surrounding heights which,
higher than the citadel, offered
strategic positions against any
attacker. Adapting the works on
the town site to marvellous effect,
Vauban made Besançon into
a defensive bastion against the
Germanic lands, a role reinforced
further in the eighteenth century.
Vauban’s works at Besançon were
completed in three stages:
- between 1675 and 1683 the town
was provided with a mighty citadel ;
- between 1675 and 1695, the
fortifications of the loop wall and
the Battant ring of defences
were rebuilt ;
- from 1680 (and into the nineteenth
century), barracks were built on
open spaces to the east of the city:
the Saint-Paul and Saint-Pierre
barracks, to accommodate 1,500
to 2,000 garrisoned soldiers.
After Vauban
In the nineteenth century, constant
progress in artillery technology,
in particular in the use of canons with
rifled barrels and shells, considerably
increased the effectiveness of artillery
and rendered Vauban’s defences
obsolete. A new system of defences
would be required to stand up to
the increasingly powerful artillery.
The ancient concept of siege
warfare in which a town resisted
attack using the protection of its walls,
was succeeded by the idea of the
military camp protected by semi-buried
fortifications built on surrounding
high ground: detached forts.
From 1945, the development of
defence policy and techniques having
robbed the town of its role as
a stronghold on the eastern front,
the military authority abandoned most
of the sites situated in the loop,
as well as most of the works on the ring
of defences and the barracks.
In 1959, the town bought back the
citadel from the army which no
longer had use for it. The military
also transferred to it and to the
Département, the old city forts
which then became administrative
or cultural heritage buildings ; those
belonging to the Besançon's ring
of defences were transferred to the
neighbouring communities from 1962.
The army now only owns two forts,
at Montfaucon and Montboucons.
Modifications to the defence system of
the site in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries have however allowed several
features to survive which bear witness
to the grand scale of the old military
base, due to the works of Vauban.

List of works
The urban ring of defences around Besançon consists
of three units:
- the citadel ;
- the loop defences ;
- the Battant ring of defences.
For each work the following are mentioned:
its (or their) main date(s) and location.
Whilst most of the works date from Vauban’s time
(and almost all were modified in the nineteenth
century), some (which he reused) date
from before Vauban ; and others were built
in the nineteenth century.
This list is not exhaustive: it does not mention every
feature of curtain walls, powder magazines, forward
slopes and underground passages etc…
To create an overview of the defence works presented in
this document, it was necessary to simplify and obtain
an outline of the works as a whole.
The citadel
The citadel
Seventeenth - nineteenth centuries
99, rue des Fusillés de la Résistance
The citadel is one of the features of
the defence system which is perfectly
consistent with Vauban’s plan
to protect Besançon and affirm
the power of the king over the town
and the province.
Built on the summit of the rock
closing the meander of the river
Doubs, it stretches over twelve hectares
and towers more than one hundred
meters above the old town. The rock,
known as Mont Caelius by the Romans,
then became Mont Saint-Étienne.
Until 1668, Mont Saint-Étienne was
only occupied by a wall barring it
to the south with a fortified gate.
On the northern side, looking
towards the town, the church of
Saint-Étienne* was built with its
cloister and outbuildings as well as the
canonry of the Saint-Jean’s cathedral
chapter, situated further down.
The citadel was built in several
stages from 1668.
Fortress, barracks, military prison...
the citadel fulfilled these various
roles over the course of the centuries.
Acquired by the Town in 1959, it has
now been restored as a cultural and
tourist site. It invites the visitor to
engage with the history of people and
various ways of life in the region.
*
It would seem that at the beginning of
Christianisation, an oratory dedicated to saint Étienne,
first martyr of the city, was erected at the foot
of the hill. This oratory was then replaced by a church
first known as Saint-Étienne, then Saint-Jean and
Saint-Étienne, and finally simply Saint-Jean (now the
cathedral of Saint-Jean). A second church, built
at the top of the hill, completed and embellished in the
eleventh century, is known simply as Saint-Étienne.

The loop defences
Built on the left bank of the Doubs,
these defence works sealed off the
Doubs from the Porte de Malpas
gate to the Porte Taillée gate. From
the Porte de Malpas gate which
today no longer exists, to the Porte
Notre-Dame gate stretches the
Tarragnoz district. From the Porte
Notre-Dame gate, the starting point of
the ring of defences around the town,
on the Cordeliers flank, 1,500 metres of
ramparts dotted with bastioned towers
and bastions protected the town. From
the Cordeliers flank to the Saint-Esprit
bastion, 500 metres of quays with
casemates protected the bank of the
Doubs. This was a double defence work
at Chamars, protecting an arm of the
Doubs which has now disappeared.
From the Saint-Esprit bastion to the
Porte Rivotte gate, another entrance
to the town where the ring of defences
around the town is completed with
another 1,500 metres of ramparts
reinforced by bastions or towers border
on the river. The Rivotte district
stretches from the Porte Rivotte gate,
the town’s real entrance, to the Porte
Taillée gate. Porte Notre-Dame and
Porte Rivotte gates are linked to the
citadel by a fortified circular walkway.
From the seventeenth to the nineteenth
century, the fortifications had their
« feet in the water ». It was the building
of the Canal Monsieur (which would
become the Rhone - Rhine Canal) that
modified their aspect, with the creation
of the towpath at the foot of the
ramparts or accessed along the Doubs.
Created by Vauban from 1680
onwards, these defences succeeded the
medieval fortifications restored and
added to by Charles V in the sixteenth
century, reusing the ancient fortifications
wherever possible. Because he had
led the 1674 siege against the town,
Vauban knew all its weak points and
was therefore in a position to design the
best possible defence system.
In 1687 he invented the bastioned
towers with thick walls and two firing
levels. These towers solved the problem
of domination by the neighbouring
heights of Bregille and Chaudanne
over the town (it was at Bregille and in
particular at Chaudanne that Vauban
had installed his batteries in 1674
to take the town and the citadel).
Many engineers would work under
Vauban’s command at Besançon and
he himself came about twenty times to
supervise the town’s fortification works.
The building of the ramparts began
at the same time as the citadel, and,
scarcely had they been finished
than, the town’s ring of defences
was being constantly repaired,
improved and modified.

1
Notre-Dame tower
Middle Ages, seventeenth century
Huddersfield-Kirklees roundabout
Also known as the Charles V tower
or bastion and sometimes the round
tower, it was thought to have been built
between 1546 and 1560 by Charles V
on the old medieval defences and was
entirely renovated by Vauban in the
seventeenth century. A curtain wall
linked it to the porte Notre-Dame.
The lower entrance to the tower was
walled up at the time of filling in
of the bastion courtyard adjacent to
it. The upper level is also walled.
1
2
Ramparts and site of the
old Notre-Dame gate
Seventeenth century
Tarragnoz district
In 1690, Vauban had the old porte
Notre-Dame walled up. It was one
of the entrances to Besançon.
Vauban had a new one built by the
Doubs in 1691. Demolished in 1894, it
was his first fortified work in this part
of the defences. The curtain wall which
extends up to the gare d’eau (wharf,
or literally, « water station ») was built
on one dating from the fifteenth century.
The projecting defence work, situated
at the brisure (break in direction) of the
curtain wall is known as the « double
guérite » (double lookout) 4 . It was
built on the base of an old fourteenth
century tower and gave as full a view
as possible over the surrounding area.
2
3
Porte Notre-Dame bastion
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
10, avenue de la Gare d’eau
3
Built between 1675 and 1693,
this bastion was adjacent to the porte
Notre-Dame. Its lower part included
a casemate, now walled in and
situated under the roadway and
its upper part has a parapet drilled with
murder holes and artillery embrasures.
The guardhouse of the old portal
is still visible from the bastion gorge.

5
Waterstation guardhouse
(Corps de garde de la gare d’eau)
Nineteenth century
Chamars Promenade
It controlled access of boats
to the water station.
6
Town bastion
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Chamars Promenade
Built in the Middle Ages on an islet
on the edge of the river, the town mill
was encompassed by Vauban into a
bastion in order to protect it.
In the nineteenth century, the creation
of the towpath for the Canal Monsieur
rendered its use obsolete . The bastion
was called the town mill bastion
and became a real defence work and
became known as the town bastion.
7
Chamars bastioned tower
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Chamars Promenade
Remarkable innovations by Vauban,
the first bastioned towers flanking
urban defences were built in Besançon
from 1687. Smaller than the bastions,
they have two firing levels. The upper
one, open to the skies and the lower
one to shelter the canons from shots
raining down from the neighbouring
high ground. Vauban, keen to protect
the people, made these works partly
with brick as splinters from such
material caused by canonballs were
less dangerous than splinters of stone.
The Chamars bastioned tower was
built on the rock, on the river bank,
between 1687 and 1691. It was
Vauban’s only tower to have survived
to date approximately as he designed
it. It was covered in the nineteenth
century as were the other towers of
the defences encircling the town.

8
9
Le Marais bastioned tower
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Chamars Promenade
Built on the rock, on the river bank
between 1687 and 1691,
it resembled that of Chamars. 10
Cordeliers bastioned tower
Archbishop’s bastion
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Chamars Promenade
The archbishop’s mill was constructed
in the Middle Ages on the arm of
the Doubs dividing Chamars into
two. Vauban encircled it with
his fortifications, surrounding it with
a bastion. Construction of the
Canal Monsieur rendered it obsolete.
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Chamars promenade
The Cordeliers bastioned tower,
also known as the hospital bastion
or Canot tower, probably completed
in 1691, is a pentagonal bastioned
tower designed like the
previous ones which was subject
to the same modifications.

13
11
Quai Vauban
Seventeenth century
The works on the quay on either
side of the porte Battant, on the side
of the loop, started in 1691 under
the supervision of engineer Isaac
Robelin, director of the Franche-Comté
fortifications, against the advice of
Vauban who only wanted
to build a simple rampart. The
project, which involved realigning
the façades of the houses, would
never be completed due to lack of
funds. To celebrate the glory of Louis
XIV, a triumphal arch was erected on
the bridge between 1691 and 1693.
The base of the gate had a defensive
function: two batteries with casemates
were there for firing upstream and
downstream and to prevent the Doubs
from being crossed. In poor condition,
the arch was knocked in 1776.
Cordeliers flank casemate
Seventeenth century
Chamars Promenade / Quai Vauban
The Cordeliers flank is a reinforced
vaulted artillery-proof casemate
for three pieces of artillery which
could aim low fire over the Doubs,
between the Cordeliers tower and the
Arenes bastion situated on the other
bank. The entrance is no longer visible
as the buildings of the Lycée Pasteur
school are in front of it: perhaps the
entrance to the casemate has been
buried under these buildings or under
the embankment next to the road.
Casemate on the Poitune flank
12
Seventeenth century
Quai Vauban (entrance at the corner of the
rue du Lycée and the rue Claude Pouillet
is currently occupied by a restaurant)
12
Saint-Esprit bastion
14
Seventeenth century
Corner of Quai Vauban/rue Jean Petit
This was built between 1692 and 1695
and levelled in 1895. In its left flank
there is a casemate which had two
pieces of artillery for directing low
fire over the Doubs downstream.
Its right-hand flank included
a slope down to a watering place.
This was a vaulted passage in the
ramparts which enabled horses to be
taken to drink the river water.
The passage was equipped with a
firing arcade and was closed by gates.
14
This casemate had the same
function as the Cordeliers casemate,
but only had two canons.
11

16
16
15
15
Ruins of the Saint-Pierre
bastioned tower
Levelled ramparts
Twentieth century
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries.
Avenue Élisée Cusenier
Marché-Beaux-Arts underground car park,
Charlotte square and car park,
Avenue Élisée Cusenier
Only the bottom of the face and
right-hand flank of the Saint-Pierre
bastioned tower, built between 1687
and 1690 are still visible. In the
eighteenth century, the tower became
a gunpowder magazine ; it was then
roofed in lauzes (flat stones). Levelled
between 1895 and 1897, together
with the rampart which was built
before it, it is the only one of the six
bastioned towers that were destroyed.
The Saint-Esprit bastion is the start
of what are now known as the
« levelled ramparts ». At the end
of the nineteenth century, after
dismantling the urban defences,
the Town levelled part of its walls,
from the Bastion du Saint-Esprit
through to the bastioned
Saint-Pierre tower . Demolition
works were carried out
between 1895 and 1897.
17
Saint-Paul mill bastion
17
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue Arthur Gaulard
The mill of Saint-Paul abbey straddled
an arm of the Doubs. Around 1689,
Vauban surrounded it with a bastion.
In the nineteenth century,
the completion of the Canal Monsieur
with its towpath which follows
the course of the riverbank and
the loop required the demolition of
the Saint-Paul mill. A sluice gate was
then created at the site of the mill races
(channels in which paddle wheels are
situated). These were moved under
the flanks of the bastion where they
can still be seen. A flour mill which
supplied flour to the entire garrison
until the middle of the twentieth
century was then built above it.

Footbridge
25
26
27
24
29
28
23
16
15
17
Republi

c bridge
14
22
Bregille bridge
Battant bridge
13
Bregille
18
Railway bridge
12
19
11

21
20
10
The Citadel
Canot bridge
1
9
2
3
5
4

Charles de Gaulle
bridge
6
8
The loop defences Battant defences
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Notre-Dame tower
Ramparts and site of the old
Notre-Dame gate
Porte Notre-Dame bastion
Double guérite (double lookout)
Waterstation guardhouse
Town bastion
Chamars bastioned tower
Le Marais bastioned tower
Archbishop’s bastion
Cordeliers bastioned tower
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
Cordeliers flank casemate
Casemate on the Poitune flank
Quai Vauban
Saint-Esprit bastion
Levelled ramparts
Ruins of the Saint-Pierre bastioned tower
Saint-Paul mill bastion
Bregille bastioned tower
7
Rivotte bastioned tower
Porte Rivotte gate
Chaudanne
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
Arènes bastion
Charmont bastion
Charmont demi-lune
Fort Griffon
Battant demi-lune and guardhouse
Battant bastion
Montmart tower
Pelote tower
Pelote counterguard

18
18
Bregille bastioned tower
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue Arthur Gaulard
Built between 1687 and 1689,
it is the only bastioned tower to be
built entirely of stone and had an
annular vault on a central pillar,
containing a well. It had to provide
flanking for the Rivotte tower
and also had a defensive role for
the Saint-Paul mill. At the end of
the nineteenth century, it was converted
to a military dovecote, which would
continue to be used until 1920.
19
19
Rivotte bastioned tower
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue Arthur Gaulard
The Rivotte bastioned tower was built
between 1687 and 1690. Its foundations
were built on the rock, on the bank of
the river and the ditch situated in front
between the Doubs and the citadel hill,
was filled with water. The rampart was
modified when the Besançon - Le Locle
railway line was built at the end of the
nineteenth century, then again, when the
river port was modified in 1938.
Like the Bregille bastioned tower,
it has a circular vault on a central pillar
containing a well. This well formed a
link with the upper-floor platform,
for the passage of personnel and
equipment. In the nineteenth century,
when the roof was built, this well was
opened up in order to collect rainwater.
20
20
Porte Rivotte gate
Middle Ages
Rue Rivotte
Created in the Middle Ages in the
wall built along the river, the Porte
Rivotte gate guarded the passage
between the Doubs and the citadel
rock to protect the town. In the first
half of the sixteenth century, on the
initiative of Emperor Charles V,
the municipal authorities strengthened
the fortifications of the loop. The Porte
Rivotte gate was then widened and
a drawbridge installed between the
two conical-roofed towers. After
the French conquest, its central part
was reconstructed. The façade is still
decorated with the royal sun, emblem
of Louis XIV. A new modification,
in 1893, entailed removal of the
drawbridge and the portcullis, filling
in of the ditches on the town side,
destruction of the building of the
town and building of walkways
through the towers. With the porte
Taillée*, further up the route de la
Suisse, the Porte Rivotte gate is the
last of the town’s fortified entrances.
* Originally, Mont Saint-Étienne, on which the citadel
was built went straight down to the river. It was not
until the ninth and tenth centuries that an access
road was built towards the district with a fortified
gate, the porte Taillée. The latter was widened in
the tenth century to enable access of pedestrians,
cavalry and carriages then was modified several
times over the course of the centuries. It was
a first line of defence, the real gate being the
Porte Rivotte gate, an opening in the wall of the
fortifications surrounding the loop in the river Doubs.

Battant defences
The Battant fortifications were created
between 1677 and 1688. From 1677,
the defences were planned by engineer
Montille in accordance with Vauban’s
designs. Situated on the right bank
of the Doubs, they surround the
Battant* district from Arènes
as far as the Pelote tower near the
Mouillère stream. The ground rises
in a slope from the river, at an
altitude of 238 metres up to
the Battant heights which peak at an
altitude of 280 metres. The highest
point is Fort Griffon, which Vauban
decided to build in 1680 and which
might be considered as a second citadel.
The Battant ring of defences has three
entrance gates each protected by
a bastion and a demi-lune ; a forward
slope stretched out in front of the
defence works. The great works carried
out at the end of the nineteenth century
and the beginning of the twentieth
century modified this unit. Nowadays,
the gates have disappeared, parts
of the ramparts have been replaced
by the carriageway and the ditches
have become roads or car parks.
*
Before the quays were built, the rue Battant gave
access from the Battant bridge to the Mouillère
spring, the stream which flows into the Doubs
near to the Pelote tower. This stream worked
a battoir, or battant - a fulling mill - which gave
its name to the road, then to the district.
In days gone by, restricted to the section on the other
side of the rues Battant and du Petit Battant, this name
now refers to the entire old district situated on the
right bank of the Doubs, which is the meeting point of
the ancient quarters of Battant, Charmont and Arènes.
Arènes bastion
21
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Rue d’Arènes
22
The bastion d’Arènes marks the
start of the wall around the Battant
district, situated on the right bank of
the Doubs. In the nineteenth century,
this work was significantly restored,
in particular when the rues d’Arènes
and de Port Citeaux as well as the
quai Veil Picard were built. At the
time of the construction of the quay,
the military built gates equipped with
drawbridges. No longer in existence,
they served to isolate the town, in
particular in the evening at curfew time.
Charmont bastion
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue Charles Siffert
The Charmont bastion was built
on a part of the old medieval wall.
The porte de Charmont, built in the
fourteenth century and modified in
the fifteenth century under Charles V,
was completed with the building of
an artillery bulwark. Vauban did
not have the gate demolished and
blocked up, but cleverly used it, as
an underground passage under the
bastion. In the twentieth century, during
town restructuring works, the bastion
was significantly altered and vestiges of
the medieval gate could be excavated.

Charmont demi-lune
Built between 1677 and 1679,
it was restored in the nineteenth and
the twentieth centuries at the time of
the road improvements. It protected
the porte de Charmont which was
destroyed in 1894 and gave access
to the town.
Fort Griffon
23 24
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue de la Paix
Place Griffon
24
The current fort was built as from 1680
on Vauban’s plans. It succeeded a first
bastion which might have been built
in 1595 by Italian engineer Jean
Griffoni, when the troops of the king
of France Henry IV were threatening
to lay siege to Besançon. This fort,
the town’s bridgehead, which occupied
a prime location, might be considered
a second citadel. It served the function
of a redoubt holding a key position
on the right bank and its design enabled
firing both out into the countryside in
the event of attack, and over the city in
the event of an uprising « It alone, with
a garrison of just 200 men would better
contain the population than 1200
accommodated in ordinary barracks. »
23
wrote Vauban. With three bastions
one with a cavalier. It had an entrance
gate which, up to the beginning of the
twentieth century, was protected by a
ditch, now filled in, and equipped with
a drawbridge. The courtyard in which
the chapel was built is surrounded
by three ranges of buildings. Two of
them are barracks built in accordance
with the modular barracks prototype,
Vauban style, the second included
the guardhouse as well as the fort
commander’s accommodation.
Designed to accommodate the
troops, Fort Griffon was used by the
military until 1945 then from 1946
it was used as a school. It is now
one of the buildings of the Teacher
Training University Institute of
Franche-Comté. Fort Griffon was listed
as a historical monument in 1944.
22

25
Battant demi-lune
and guardhouse
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Avenue de la Paix, rue des Glacis,
Avenue Edgar Faure
The Battant demi-lune, built between
1677 and 1688, gave access to the town
and protected the porte Battant which
no longer exists. Restored, the two
guardhouses date from the seventeenth
and nineteenth centuries respectively.
26
Battant bastion
Seventeenth and nineteenth centuries
Rue Battant, avenue Edgar Faure,
Avenue du maréchal Leclerc
This was probably built from 1677
onwards. Its right-hand flank has a
lower flank and its left-hand flank
adjoined the Battant curtain wall,
which no longer exists. Its left-hand
side was equipped with a walkway
which linked it to the glacis or forward
slope. The entire parapet was levelled
to the height of the cordon and the
entire defence works are now a public
park and children’s play area.
25
26
27
29

Montmart tower
Pelote tower
27 28 29
Thirteenth century
Fifteenth and seventeenth centuries
Above the Battant rise
Quai de Strasbourg
Also known as the square tower,
it is at the centre of the Battant bastion.
Probably built in the thirteenth century,
it was part of the medieval porte de
Battant. Vauban included it in the
Battant cavalier and converted into
a powder store. In the nineteenth
century, when the bastion cavalier was
razed to the ground, the tower survived.
28
In the twelfth century the town
consisted of two distinct districts:
the ecclesiastical quarter on the slopes
of the hill and the entire loop protected
by the river, as well as the quarter on
the right bank of the Doubs – what
is known now as the quartier Battant
(the Battant district) – closed off by a
defence work. In the thirteenth century,
new ramparts doubled all these lines
of defence and were accompanied by
a wall with about ten access portals.
In the fifteenth century, the emergence of
fire arms necessitated the strengthening
of the fortifications. In 1475, major
works were undertaken near
the porte de Battant, with the
construction of the « tour neuve de la
Pillotte » (the new Pillotte tower) which
may have derived its name from the
Pillot family from whom the land was
purchased.
After the French conquest, Vauban,
commissioned to renovate the town’s
fortifications, kept the Pelote tower
and integrated it into his ramparts. The
Pelote tower was listed as a Historical
Monument in 1942.
Pelote counterguard
Seventeenth century
Quai de Strasbourg
Built between 1677 and 1688, it served
to protect the tower and increase its
firing line by doubling it. This is a
trapezoidal work, the gorge of which is
parallel to the Mouillère gully.

Chaudanne fort

Chaudanne hill
In 1674, Vauban installed several
batteries on Chaudanne hill in order to
lay siege to the city. However, after
the conquest he vehemently opposed
the construction of a fort at Chaudanne
which, being on a higher level, would
pose a threat to the citadel.
The development of artillery
necessitated the building of new forts
around the town and the current
fort was built between 1841 and
1845. It was then part of the series of
fortifications designed to protect the
town. In 1944, it was the scene
of violent confrontation between
German soldiers and those of the
seventh US infantry regiment which
liberated it on 7th Bregille and Beauregard of forts and hills
September. The
In 1674, Louis XIV and his retinue
set up camp on Beauregard Hill to join
the attack on the citadel. Subsequently
artillery advances necessitated
modification of the site.
In 1791, a lunette d’Arçon - a small
defence work - was built on the hill.
It was transformed into a fort between
1845 and 1870. Polygonal in outline in
order better to adapt to the small site,
this work is the only one of its kind
in Besançon.
Designed to protect the fort of Bregille
to the north, it also protected part of the
town ramparts on the left bank and the
Battant bridgehead on the right bank.
In 1674, at the time of the conquest,
Vauban had installed on the Bregille
hill some artillery pieces with which to
bombard the city.
The 1814 siege made clear the necessity
of occupying the summit of the hill to
enlarge the defensive perimeter of the
town and the current fort was built
between 1820 and 1832.

Glossary
Artillery bulwark
a generic term referring to any work
designed to carry artillery added in front
of an older fortification which had not
been designed for the firing of canons.
Bastion
in principle in modern fortifications,
a low pentagonal work projecting
from a wall. The bastion has five
sides: two faces, two flanks and the
gorge. It may however differ slightly
when it is based on a previous
work (a bulwark, for example).
Bastioned tower
pentagonal tower with the
function of a bastion.
Vauban designed this for the
Besançon site in order to adapt to
the constraints of the terrain.
Casemate
a vaulted artillery-proof gun chamber.
The casemate designed to serve as
a gun emplacement (known as an
« active casemate ») contained
a ventilation system for the evacuation
of fumes from the firing.
Cavalier
a raised earthwork intended to receive
artillery, raised above another work or
above the curtains of the body of the
fortification to double its firing range.
Citadel
fort or fortress commanding a town,
often straddling its wall, and more
rarely inside it. The citadel often served
as an arsenal and barracks, and possibly
as a redoubt (work constructed inside
another where refuge can be taken
to extend resistance). Its function
was to survey the town itself as well
as the surrounding countryside.
Cordon
semi-circular projection emphasising
the junction of the embankment scarp
and the parapet. The cordon indicates
the magistral line, an imaginary line
followed by the crown of the scarp.
Everything below the cordon is covered
from the view of the attacker.
Counterguard
low outer work protecting at a distance
the faces of a bastion or a bastioned
tower while doubling the line of fire.
Curtain
section of wall between two
towers or two bastions.
Demi-lune/ravelin
protected outworks beyond the
curtain of a bastioned front and
generally circled by its own ditch.
The demi-lune consists of two faces
at an angle and a gorge, but may
also have flanks. It often served to
protect an entrance to the site.
Fort
stronghold containing a garrison
and serving to support the defensive
system of a frontier or town.
Glacis
inclined area extending in front of
a fortification.
Gorge
part of a work placed to the
least exposed side, towards
the inside of the site.
Guardhouse
a lodge for the guarding soldiers.

Guérite (lookout)
small tower projecting from a wall
serving as a lookout and guard post.
Lower flank
work attached to the flank of the
bastion to correct a slope that
is too steep.
Lunette
advanced work of the same shape
as a demi-lune but not integrated
into a bastioned front.
Parapet
wall or embankment enabling defenders
of a fortification to shoot from a
point covered from enemy fire.
Rampart
raised defensive earthwork often
retained by timbers or a retaining
wall (revêtement). The earthwork is
the upper platform of the rampart
serving as a defensive walkway.
Reinforced vault
comprising a vault enabling
resistance to bombardment.
Exploring
the fortifications
on foot
many circuits are possible ;
a wide range of themed visits
the citadel, the bastioned towers,
Fort Griffon, pedestrian walks around
the forts etc. accompanied by an approved
Besançon Ville d’art et d’histoire
(Besançon Town of Art and History)
guide, approximately 2 hours
for each visit, 4 hours for walks.
by boat
The fortifications along the water’s edge
guided tour conducted by an approved
Besançon Ville d’art et d’histoire
(Besançon Town of Art and History)
guide, approximately 1 hour 15 minutes
by bicycle
On the Eurovéloroute (Euro-cycle route)
(Eurovélo 6 Atlantique-Mer Noire)
also
by coach, on roller skates, taxi or by plane
For all information on visits
and walks, please contact:
Office de tourisme et
des congrès de Besançon
2, place de la 1 ère Armée Française
25000 Besançon - France
Tel. +33(0)3 81 80 92 55
Fax +33(0)3 81 80 58 30
www.besancon-tourisme.com
info@besancon-tourisme.com

In 2007, France submitted the works
of Vauban for classification as a Unesco
world heritage site.
Document produced by
the Town of Besançon
heritage department
(service du Patrimoine)
December 2007
Texts
Marie-Hélène Bloch,
with the assistance of Roland Bois
Model and illustrations
Guillaume Bertrand, Besançon
(based on the geographical chart
drawn up by: LM Communiquer)
Translations
Juralangues
www.juralangues.com
www.besancon.fr