Château de Vincennes

Château de Vincennes stands beside the town of Vincennes, on Paris’s eastern edge near the Bois de Vincennes. The former fortress and royal residence combines high defensive walls, towers, a deep moat, and a fortified gateway. Its massive fourteenth-century donjon rises as Europe’s tallest fortified central tower.

Construction expanded mainly between 1361 and 1369 under John II and Charles V. Louis VII had established a royal residence here in 1178, while Louis IX later held royal councils on the site. French kings used these walls as a refuge and residence before the château became a prison, manufactory, and military headquarters. The Sainte-Chapelle de Vincennes, begun in 1379 and completed in 1552, brings Flamboyant Gothic architecture into the fortified complex.

The chapel became a historic monument in 1853, and the donjon followed in 1913. The Marquis de Sade and the future Henry IV both spent time as prisoners here.

City: Vincennes
Content updated: 2026-06-22

Image: Edal Anton Lefterov CC BY-SA 3.0
Image: Pierre Nicolas RansonettePublic domain
Image: David Baron from San Francisco, California, USA CC BY-SA 2.0
Image: Jean FouquetPublic domain
Image: Sputniktilt CC BY-SA 3.0

Take this page with you

The myTuur app is free, and once you are standing at a spot its story starts by itself.

Spots like this one are the stops myTuur strings into tours through Vincennes. In the app, each story begins where you stand: walk up to a spot and it starts, read it on screen or listen as you go, then follow the route to the next one.

What is myTuur?

myTuur is a free city-guide app. Its tours are built from spots, and each spot carries a story that starts when you get there, to read or to listen to as you like.