And on my ever lasting road warrior trips ,and took the road again to come back to my dear Seine et Marne to see a first many times passed by it ,and visit the castle but never in the village of Maincy ! Bear in mind, this is the village where the grand Château Vaux le Vicomte is located (see posts). The village of Maincy is located in the Seine et Marne department 77 in the Île-de-France region of my belle France, This is deep country and beautiful you need a car but darn worth it. Maincy first village in Île-de-France to receive the “Small City of Character” label. I like to tell you a bit on this post about the Curiosities of Maincy !! Hope you enjoy the post as I.
The village of Maincy was created in the Middle Ages, as evidenced by its Romanesque church. It was the village attached to the castle of Vaux-le-Vicomte (see post) in the 17C. Previously, the Goblin factory was in this village. The village is only 6 km from Melun and about 60 km from Paris, It has two small rivers crossing it for over 6 km: the Almont river, also called “ru d’Ancœur” or “ru de Courtenain”, a tributary of the Seine and the ru Bobée, which runs for 11 km and joins the Almont. If the village is served by many road links with no less than 6 departmental (but the most important and the one that goes to the castle is the D215) , and access to the A5 motorway 4 km away, it does not benefit from a train station, the nearest station being that of Melun.
Maincy has the privilege of hosting one of the masterpieces of Grand Siècle architecture: the castle and park of Vaux-le-Vicomte, high places of national architectural and historical heritage, which cover almost half of the 1019 hectares of the village. There were many personalities passing or staying here some notable ones were André Le Nôtre, architect, gardener, creator of the gardens of the castle of Vaux-le-Vicomte amongst others. Nicolas Fouquet, Superintendent of King Louis XIV. Louis Le Vau, French architect. Alfred Sommier industrialist, restorer of the castle of Vaux-le-Vicomte and Paul Cézanne, painted a famous painting, the Maincy bridge, exhibited at the Orsay museum in Paris. Also, Jean Alexandre Melchior de Vogüé, is a French resistance fighter (CDLR movement or Those of the Resistance; his son Patrice de Vogüé heir and administrator of the Château de Vaux le Vicomte,until his passing in 2020.
The pretty things to see other than the must castle are the Saint Etienne Church, Let met tell you a bit about it ok, A first church, already dedicated to Saint Etienne,(St Stephens) occupied the place of the current church. Its bell tower is high on what was a defense tower with buttresses that have remained very visible. The four gargoyles are a vestige of the 13C. The churcg bears the mark of the Grand Siècle inscribed in the wake of Nicolas Fouquet. It was to his favorite architect, Louis Le Vau, that the superintendent of finances entrusted the task of enlarging and embellishing the church of Maincy. From the primitive character of the church, he made a clean sweep to impose a decorative facade in the Louis XIII style. The left aisle is flanked by an open porch raised on steps giving the church a certain originality.
The bell tower was built on the site of an old Gallo-Roman tower. A first sanctuary, dedicated to Saint Etienne, stood around the year 1000 in place of the current church. Some vestiges of the 12C are still attested in the church. After destroying the village of Vaux to build his castle, Fouquet obtained the restoration of the nearby village church rather than rebuilding that of Vaux. The restoration was carried out under the direction of Louis Le Vau, architect of Vaux-le-Vicomte, in the 1660s. The Sommier family, who bought the Vaux-le-Vicomte estate in 1889, were also very interested in the church: major works were carried out until the beginning of WWI. A wooden balustrade protects the baptismal font, it is historically the old balustrade of the choir. There is also a tripartite confessional, decorated with a medallion with floral motifs.
Other things to see worth mentioning are the nearby Maison des Carmes in which the workshops of Maincy tapestries by Fouquet, these same workshops were transferred to Paris by order of King Louis XIV who had ousted Nicolas Fouquet, his Superintendent of Finances, and first owner of Vaux-le-Vicomte and became the Gobelins tapestry. The bridge at a place called Trois-Moulins, located on the Almont river, was painted by Paul Cézanne under the title Pont de Maincy, now expose at the Orsay Museum of Paris. And the less known lavoir or wash house right by the church above and quant nice,traditions of old still kept intact. The Almont river has its source in the pond of Ancoeur 35 km from the village, in the town of Bailly-Carrois. From the heights of the village, the rû sometimes called rû des Moulins crosses the center of the village to flow into the Almont. In 1853, the village of Maincy had a public lavoir or wash house built which received the water channeled under the street via a vaulted passage; another passage made on the other side allows the flow of water towards its brook.
The town of Maincy on its heritage: https://www.maincy.fr/patrimoine/
The Seine et Marne dept 77 tourist office on Maincy : https://www.seineetmarnevivreengrand.fr/explorer/maincy-4918611
There you go folks, another dandy ride in my road warrior mode,again, And another first in my world map in quant countryside Maincy !! Always so much to see in my belle France. This is the Curiosities of Maincy !!, Again ,hope you enjoy the post as I
And remember, happy travels, good health, and many cheers to all !!!
Paris1972-Versailles2003 