Author: Maarten Koning

Vaud (pagus Waldensis in Latin, Pays de Vaud in French) has been a strategic space since Roman times, situated at the crossroads of major roads connecting northern and southern Europe.

Vaud was part of the ‘first’ kingdom of Burgundy (443-543) after the fall of the Roman Empire, then it came under Merovingian (561-751) and Carolingian authority (751-843).

It became a county, comitatus Waldensis, in this period. Vaud was part of the second kingdom of Burgundy (888-1032). Thereafter the region was part of the Holy Roman Empire.

The Duchy of Savoy (the counts until 1416) took control in 1286. The carré savoyard is the Savoyard castle from this period.

This type of castle appeared for the first time in the years 1258-1265 in Yverdon. (Quelle: O. Meuwly and others, Histoire Vaudoise, Lausanne 2015).

The church  (Saint-Jean-Baptiste) is a jewel of Romanesque art and is a national monument. The architecture shows the different phases of construction and transformation of nine centuries.

The Romanesque structure, beautiful sculptures and frescoes are still intact.

The Benedictine monastery was handed over to the monks of the Chaise-Dieu (Auvergne) in 1178. The bell tower and the dome were built in the Romanesque style of the Auvergne.

The choir was rebuilt in the Gothic style and the north chapel was added in the 13th century. The monastery was dissolved in 1534.

(Source and further: information at www.vd.ch).

Othon I of Grandson (1238-1328) expanded the fortress and the power of his lordship. The castle was owned by the House of Savoy (1389-1420) and from 1420 by the House of Chalon, an ally of the Burgundian Duke Charles the Bold.

The Swiss defeated the Burgundian troops in 1476 at the Battle of Grandson. Bern and Fribourg occupied Grandson. The castle was the residence of their bailiffs until 1798. Toady, the castle houses the Grandson Museum.

(Source and further information: www.chateau-grandson.ch).