Le Château d'Arlempdes in Auvergne — some history

The château at Arlempdes, south of Le Puy-en-Velay and 15 miles from the source of the Loire River (which is 629 miles long), is mentioned for the first time in a bull published by the pope Clement IV in the year 1267. Building on top of the basalt "dike" continued until the 16th century. The château complex is completely integrated into the volcanic peak, so it's not a typical feudal fortress. The ramparts are extensions of the natural rock and it is almost impossible for anyone to climb to the top. Its purpose was to protect the site against invaders coming down from the north, who coveted this part of the country.

Until the 16th century, the château was owned by several different local families, including some of the most powerful families in the southern part of the Auvergne region. It became a part of the properties around France controlled by Diane de Poitiers (1500-1566) — of Chenonceau and Chaumont fame —when the daughter of a local baron married into her family. Diane's coat of arms is carved into a wall of the Arlempdes château. The family's residence, of which only one wall remains standing, was built during Diane's time. Later in the same century, during the Wars of Religion, it served as barracks for royal troops fighting the local Protestants.

Increasingly neglected by families who owned it in later centuries, the Arlempdes château was completely abandoned by the time of the 1789 French Revolution. The site was no longer strategically important. It fell into ruin, and was quarried by local people who needed stones to build houses and walls. In the 19th century, the château was sold for one symbolic franc to a Catholic charity. In 1963, descendents of some of the old families that had owned it in past centuries bought it back and undertook to restore the château.

— Thanks to the article about Arlempdes on French Wikipédia  for this information. —