Château de Petit-Bourg
The Château de Petit-Bourg is in Évry-sur-Seine, Essonne, on the Seine near the Forêt de Sénart. The first château at Petit-Bourg began in the 1600s for André Courtin and was finished around 1635 for Jean Galland. Around 1650, Louis Barber de La Rivière, bishop of Langres, had gardens designed by François Mansart. Jules Hardouin-Mansart worked there around 1662.
Around 1695, Françoise-Athénaïs, marquise de Montespan, bought Petit-Bourg. She made major changes and had André Le Nôtre design the gardens in a French style with terraces. She took refuge there after her disgrace. When she died in 1707, her son Louis Antoine de Pardaillan de Gondrin, duke of Antin, inherited the château and redid the gardens.
Between 1716 and 1722, the château was almost completely rebuilt by the architect Pierre Cailleteau, known as Lassurance. The new Château de Petit-Bourg became a princely residence and a showcase of the time. Notable decorations included a cabinet in the gallery of the king’s apartment and the grand salon, decorated by Louis-Claude Vassé with royal portraits and ducal emblems. Before the reconstruction, Louis XIV stayed there in 1717, and the Tsar Peter the Great visited Petit-Bourg.
After the rebuild, Louis XV and Queen Maria Leszczyńska stayed there often. Madame de Pompadour saw it while living at Étiolles and dreamed of the residence.
After the duke of Antin’s death, the château stood empty for years. In 1750 it was bought by Marie Jacomel, the widow of Louis Chauvelin, and in 1756 a new neoclassical château was built by architect Jean-Michel Chevotet.
During the French Revolution it belonged to Bathilde d’Orléans. It later passed through several owners and, in 1827, was bought by banker Alexandre Aguado, who hosted Gioacchino Rossini and served as mayor of Évry.
The creation of the railroad from Paris to Corbeil cut the park in two and separated it from the Seine. Aguado sold the property in 1840 to speculators who divided it. The Germans occupied the château in World War II and burned it in 1944 as they left. The ruins were razed, and on the site a smaller residence, Parc de Petit-Bourg, was built. An allée d’honneur—the avenue lined with chestnut and lime trees—still marks where the château stood.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 08:38 (CET).