3 - MINERVE CASTLE. HÉRAULT. AUDE. 1496. Before the Keeper of the Common Seal appointed for contracts in the Seneschalsy of LYON and the Bailiwick of MACON. Today we have seen … the letters patent of the King, our lord, in which the said Lord Thiroux DESCAVES, his ordinary valet, is granted the Office of Castellan, Captain, and Guardian of the Town of MINERVE in the Seneschalship of CARCASSONNE, and the letterssaid Office to be verified and ratified, and that the contents thereof be fully enforced, upheld, and exercised in accordance with their form and substance, while requiring payment of the fees and duties… ” Dated September 28, 1496. Parchment (19.5 x 34.5 cm) during the reign of Charles VIII. (In 1229, under the Treaty of Paris, the Minervois region was incorporated into the French Crown and included within the Seneschalsy of Carcassonne. Minerve thus became a territory subject to the jurisdiction of a royal governor. The reconstruction of the castle and its fortifications dates from this period. During the Hundred Years’ War, the castle of Minerve served as one of the region’s defensive strongholds, particularly when the Prince of Wales, known as the Black Prince, invaded the Minervois in 1355. Over the next three centuries, Minerve passed successively from the king’s protectorate to that of the Dukes of Montmorency (governors of Languedoc). In 1632, the defeat of the Duke of Montmorency marked the decline of the great feudal lords’ power in Languedoc, and in 1637, the dismantling of Minerve Castle was officially ordered.)