In the little town called Parçay-Meslay [par-say-may-'lay] on the northeast side of Tours there's fortified farm that was built by the monks at the nearby Abbaye de Marmoutier in the 13th century. Marmoutier itself was founded by saint Martin de Tours in the fourth century A.D. The farm covered an area of two hectares (five acres) that was was completely walled in. The roof of the barn on the property was set on fire by English soldiers during the Hundred Years' War and was rebuilt in the 15th century — that roof still exists.
The ferme de Meslay is one of the finest examples of its kind of architecture still standing in France,or even in all of Europe, some say. Above, on the left, is the farm's entry gate.
Here's a wider view of the farm, which is home to an annual music festival and also used as a conference center.
Were these excellent photos taken when we were there together? I don’t recall going into the barn; it was probably closed, as usual.
ReplyDeleteYes, I took them the same day as the ones at Luynes.
ReplyDeleteI find peace in monasteries. The wide view is lovely. What is that green vegetation next to the Queen Ann's lace? There is a Lagrange Kentucky near where I grew up.
ReplyDeleteGlad you told us how to pronounce Parçay-Meslay - that wouldn't have been my guess. What an interesting building with the rose "window" in stone!
ReplyDeleteOooh, fascinating place. I've never seen nor heard of it before. You show us the best stuff, Ken!
ReplyDeleteLike Diogenes, I wouldn't have known to pronounce this correctly. I never think of a middle s as being silent. With all of the news stories in the past several months about Ghislaine Maxwell, they always mute the s and I wouldn't have thought to done that, either. Is this always the case? I'm stumped.
Our friend Marie-Jacques lives in a town named Le Mesnil-Esnard. Neither S is pronounced. There's a town near us named Meusnes. Silent S.
DeleteHa! Yes Judy - I would have sworn I'd always heard Ghis - laine with the "s" pronounced when I studied French! So I was surprised to hear the newscaster's pronunciation of it.
DeleteAs for the first name of lovely Ms. Maxwell, I have heard two French pronunciations: gui-laine et gisse-laine depending on the way the owner of the first name wants it pronounced. I wonder how it is pronounced in English.
DeleteJudy, I spent some time looking at lists of all the town and village names in our area of the Loire valley (le Loir-et-Cher et l'Indre-et-Loire) and found at least a few examples of names where an S before an N or L in the middle of a word is silent. One of the best-known towns with such a name is in the Paris area: Suresnes (pronounced as Surenne). Around us are Fresnes, Mesnes, Lassay-sur-Croisne, Josnes, Lisle, Mosnes, Braslou, and of course Meslay, Meusnes, and Esvres. There's also a river called l'Esves (pronounced ève). In common nouns, as opposed to proper names, those vowels followed by N or L would have a circumflex accent on them and the S would be dropped.
DeleteThere is also a river in the Perche region which rhymes exactly with Luynes : l’Huisne.
DeleteGood point.
DeleteGisse-laine is how I always heard it years ago. It is not a common name, at least in the states, and I suspect the news guessed and agreed on a version. chm, we sent you an email. And isn't it amazing in the farm pictures that they carved a rose window, which clearly never had any glass? I wonder if they design has a meaning?
ReplyDeleteAs for Ghislaine, like CHM I've heard both guee-len and jeess-len. The Wikipedia article about the masculine name Ghislain says the pronunciation with a hard g is a feature of Normandy and Picardy dialects, and the pronunciation with a soft g (zh) is more common is areas to the south. Nothing is really straightforward when it comes to proper names.
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