Places: Chateau de Chinon

It's the setting for Henry II's contentious Christmas feast with his family in The Lion in Winter, and Henry II did keep several Christmas courts at Chinon, but not one in 1183.  Still, Chinon is one of the few buildings from the early Plantagenet era that owes much of its construction to Henry, and shows what castles were like in his era,1154-1189.

Chinon is on the bank of the Vienne River.  Theobald I, Count of Blois, began building the castle on the site of earlier fortifications in the 10th century.  In 1037, Fulk of Anjou took over the castle and it passed into the hands of the Plantagenet family.  Geoffrey Plantagenet had two sons, Henry II and Geoffrey and left the castle to Geoffrey.  Geoffrey, Junior, running true to family form, felt slighted by Henry's share of the inheritance and rebelled against his elder brother.  Henry II simply took Chinon away from Geoffrey and made it his main royal residence on the Continent.  It was a secure enough fortress that Henry II kept an arsenal and part of his treasury at the castle, as well as undertaking extensive renovations to make the place livable for himself and a court large enough for a king. 

The castle became a bone of contention between Henry and all of his sons, each squabbling for their share of the vast family inheritance.  Originally promised to John, this raised the ire of Henry the Young King and Richard, who rose in rebellion against their father along with their brother Geoffrey.  Henry II would die at Chinon a broken and bitter man in 1189 and Richard took over the castle as his main French residence.  Chinon fell to French forces in 1205 and remained under French control.  The Capetian kings used the castle as a prison, notably for the doomed members of the Knights Templar during the reign of Phillip IV in the early fourteenth century.  Chinon was under threat of being reclaimed by England several times during the Hundred Years War, but remained in French hands and served as the backdrop for the meeting of Joan of Arc and Charles VI in 1429.  While at the castle, Joan stayed in the Tower of Coudray, which still stands.