Central Brittany

The region of central Brittany that I visited has many attractive sites, including a medieval town, one of several designated “cities of character;” a unique chapel, wild gorges cut by a rapid stream, a ruined abbey, and a lake formed by a dam that flooded a slate quarry.

This area was not as spectacular as the coastal towns I saw, but it offered me another view of the region. I had no idea what it would be like, but I did think it would be different from the coast. It was. There were small roads will very little, or no traffic; lots of farmland; very few villages, tiny and widely spaced; and one brief passage through a very dark forest that was almost magical.

The name of Rohan appeared everywhere I went. I know that it was a very old and powerful family; I also knew that there were living descendants of the family. But I learned more as I visited the region. Rohan is the name of a town in the Morbihan section of Brittany, not very far from the area I was touring. The first person to hold a title with the name Rohan was Alain I who inherited land from his father, himself a descendant of the ancient sovereigns of Brittany going back at least to the 10th century. Ever since then, the family members held an important place in French history and made alliances with other French families. Some of the buildings I was to see were constructed at the request of one Rohan or another.
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A gate shaded by large trees (entrance to Saint-Suzanne) by Corot


We began our day in Mûr de Bretagne where the Chapel of Saint Suzanne was located. The chapel was begun in 1496 with funds donated by the Viscount of Rohan, and was restored beginning in 1694 (to 1722). Records from the early 18th c. indicate that the chapel was built on the vestiges of a small ruined chateau called “Plaisance” that belonged to the Rohan family. They planted the oak trees surrounding the chapel around 1700; the trees inspired some of paintings by Corot, a frequent visitor to this town.

The church façade is tall and slim with three openings superposed: the first is the double-arched west entrance; above it are a larger window and, on top, a smaller one. A balustrade separates the top level from the openwork spire and gothic pinnacles.



It is the interior of the church that is its most unusual feature. The ceiling immediately caught my attention. Staring down at me were portraits surrounded by cloud-like flourishes and leaves, angels and putti, some odd figures in robes, and a painting; these were painted over the wood ceiling planks and represent the stories of Christ and Saint Suzanne. The painter, Roch Delaporte, worked on the ceiling from 1722-1723. Also remarkable arethe fragments of what was the rood screen. Its wooden carved bas-reliefs illustrate the life of Saint Suzanne.

From there we drove around the northern edge of the Lake of Guerlédan, passing farmland and very old stone houses, until we reached a boat landing known as Beau Rivage. We watched a single water-ski boat make ripples in the water. The lake was formed when a dam was built in 1930. The dam flooded most of the slate quarries that were an important economic activity in the region in the 18th and 19th centuries. No houses were flooded except the gate houses; it also disrupted the flow of river traffic along the Nantes-Brest canal which used part of the Blavet. Today there is some suggestion of removing the dam to restore the river flow, but no plans have been made to date.

We continued our drive to the gorges of the Doulas. The road goes through a band of rock, schist and quartzite formed by water rapidly flowing in a narrow, winding valley. Bushes, ferns, and heather grew wild at the edges of the road along the river which eventually joins the Blavet. The river itself is shallow, but runs rapidly across a stony bed. On the other side of the road are bare rocks, some nearly vertical and some forming knife-edged peaks, all of them looking rather primitive.

The next stop was the Abbey of Bon Repos. This was a Cistercian abbey founded in the 12th century at the request of the Count Alain de Rohan. The monks chose this difficult site for practical reasons: it was near wood and water necessary for agriculture and tool-making.

A group of volunteers and artists is trying to restore the Abbey to its past grandeur. It had been pillaged and destroyed after the Revolution, and left to rot. Its stones were used as building materials. A self-guided tour brochure led us through the various parts of the abbey; it was done so well that I could visualize some of the rooms, the church, and the cloisters. The crypt of the abbey church served as the tomb for the Rohan family until the early 16th century. http://www.bon-repos.com/

Nestled in a wooded valley is a forge (Les Forges des Salles), is an old iron works from the 18th & 19th centuries. Mining operations ceased in 1880 but the site was left untouched. Certain buildings have been modified to restore their appearance to their original uses: the school, the paymaster’s office, the dining hall, the chapel and the forge and carpenter’s shop. These are open to visitors, but we came too late to see the site in detail.

On our way back to Guingamp we passed through the Forest of Quénécan. The trees were so dense that little light reached us. The sudden darkness was startling and the experience welcome. We continued our way along the south shore of the lake and stopped at the dam before resuming our route home.