The Prison Tower Museum, a frightening visit...

Built in the 11th century to defend the Porte Notre-Dame, the Tour des Prisons is located in the heart of the historic center of Lunel.

During the Wars of Religion, it was transformed into a prison, a function it performed until 1917.

Today, the Tower of the Prisons has become a Museum whose entrance is done by the Tourist Office and which proves to be unusual and even frightening.

In the darkness, with a flashlight in hand, and with a background music of prisoners' words, you can discover more than 300 graffiti, including 210 in the dungeons on the first floor, inscriptions, religious signs, drawings, engraved hearts and suns, testimonies of the prisoners' passage through these walls during 4 centuries.

In total, 52 prisoners have engraved their name or first name. A dozen inscriptions speak of injustice, suffering or personal messages.

The Prison Tower is 16 meters high and includes a cell on the first floor, two dungeons on the first floor, a walkway and intermediate rooms on the floor above, and a guard room on the top floor that became the "passenger room".

In addition to the beautifully restored doors and the fireplace of the guard room, many everyday objects were found during the excavations, mainly in the latrines of the prison.

Some of these objects, tokens, marbles, newspaper clippings, inkwells, dice, scissors, buttons, more than 100 shoes with leather or rope soles, clay or wooden pipes, scissors, clasps, and many rags... are displayed in the windows of the guard room.

 

Musée de la Tour des Prisons

16 Cours Gabriel Péri,

34400 Lunel

Tel : 04 67 71 01 37

 

http://www.ot-paysdelunel.fr/

 

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

(free version)

 


To go further....

Lunel: Vie d'autrefois

Dans ce nouvel ouvrage, nous retrouvons des vitrines de commerces et des devantures d'hôtels ou de restaurants aujourd'hui disparus. Nous entrons dans les cafés, parcourons les terrasses, traversons les rues lors des fêtes du 14 Juillet, retrouvons les enfants sur les bancs de l'école ou dans les bras du père Noël, les cabaniers semblent même nous inviter à passer le dimanche avec eux. Si les sourires nous incitent à nous attarder sur ces clichés, au fil des pages, c'est bien toute la vie économique, sociale et culturelle de Lunel durant le XXe siècle qui se révèle.

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