Victor Hugo said of Sedan, “It is one of those places where the severity of the citadel city mingles strangely with the joyous atmosphere of the garrison town.” It’s a statement that nicely sums up our experience. Sedan town is a pleasant place with a buzzing historic centre, at least on market day. Yet, there is no escaping the fact that Sedan is completely dominated by its colossal fortress. In effect, a city within a city.
The footprint of the citadel is enormous. At 35,000m², spread over seven levels, and with walls that are in places more than 25m thick, it confidently lays claim to be the largest ‘castle’ in Europe. For comparison, you could fit more than 4,900 football (soccer) pitches inside the original fortress of Sedan. What is open to the public today is a fraction of that, but a model in the fortress museum gives a true picture of this goliath.
It’s a shame the huge moats no longer hold water – they would make a great feature for the town. Instead they’ve been turned into an extensive and ugly car park at the base of the towering walls, albeit it was a very convenient car park for our hotel. On balance, given that this is one of the most extraordinary ancient military buildings in Europe, a car park doesn’t really do it justice.
The fortress evolved out of a fairly normal castle, and really began to take shape in 1424 under the leadership of Evrard III de La Marck. Sedan was an independent state that stood at a strategic point on the River Meuse at the border between France and the Holy Roman Empire. Either of which would have been quite happy to claim it for themselves. The power of the fortress guaranteed Sedan’s independence for over 200 years.
This all came to an end in 1642, when Sedan was incorporated into France and the French military occupied the castle for the next 320 years. Sedan now became a target in any conflict fought on French soil. So it was that a retreating French army, accompanied by no less a person as Emperor Napoleon III himself, arrived in Sedan in 1870 and was immediately surrounded by a numerically superior Prussian army.
The inevitable surrender didn’t take long, in fact less than two days of bombardment. The Emperor was captured, a victim of his own hubris after he had been goaded into declaring war on Prussia. His Second Empire collapsed to be replaced by the Third Republic who continued to fight. Such was the magnitude of the capture of Sedan, up until its defeat in 1918, Germany celebrated an annual Sedan Day with a public holiday.
All of this history and more is covered in the museum that is now part of the self guided tour of the fortress. It is a truly impressive place. The route takes you through the different levels of the castle, and through different periods of history, and out onto the battlements. The views over the town are magnificent. From on high you can see other parts of the fortifications that aren’t visible from the town.
The entire thing was bought by the town of Sedan from the French army in 1962, for the symbolic price of one French franc. It finally opened to the public in 1995. It’s an interesting tour that ends in a medieval themed tavern on the central courtyard. We decided to have a beer from the local Ardwen brewery, but if you really wanted to get into the castle vibe, part of it is now a hotel.
We left through the Porte des Princes, a narrow entrance in the massive defensive wall. Heading into town we passed a segment of the immense Bastion du Gouverneur walls that have been destroyed. Not by an enemy, but by the French army who used it to test out the effectiveness of explosives. It left a very large gap in the defences. We had one more night in Sedan and then it was back to Brussels.
