Of the vast domain which has been parcelled out through the centuries, only the courtyard and the front of the house remain.

This house has been named after Louise de Clermont whose second husband was Antoine de Crussol, duc d'Uzès, and who remained Countess of Tonnerre during 56 years. Louise and Antoine d'Uzès, great builders, chose Maulnes site, in the heart of the forest, to erect their Tonnerrois château.

The date (1533) engraved during the restoration of 1888, is controversial: the architectural characteristics seem to refer to the second half of the sixteenth century.

The hotel seems to have been built by a rich bourgeois (Jean Canelle (1503-1562) tax officer in Tonnerre) after 1556. His descendants lived there until 1651. Louise de Clermont, friend of the Canelle stayed there several times.

The latin inscription is a verse of psalm 126: "If the Lord does not protect this house, its keeper will watch in vain". It might be an allusion to the terrible fire which destroyed in 1556 the whole town of Tonnerre, with the exception of the Hôtel Dieu.

In 1879, the house was bought by the Caisse d'Epargne (the Savings Bank). The restoration of 1888 was highly controversial. The two lateral statues date from this period.

Mullioned windows, corner turrets, lanterns, niches, scallops, exquisitely friezes decorated with arabesques, with fauns… all the decorative details of this house make it a beautiful example of the Renaissance refinement.

 

Born in 1728 in Tonnerre, in the Hôtel d'Uzès,
Lawyer, working in the "secret" chambers of Louis XV,
he wrote ambiguous memoirs
which are still reinforcing his legend.