Montreux - Château de Chillon

1.5km/1mi beyond Territet, in the outlying district of Veytaux, is the popular tourist attraction of Chillon Castle, a stronghold of the Counts and Dukes of Savoy. Situated on a rocky islet close to the shore, it commanded the road from Burgundy over the Great St Bernard into Italy.

The castle, which now belongs to the canton of Vaud (conducted tours), was built in the ninth or 10th C., enlarged in the 11th-12th C. and given its present form in the 13th C. In the basement are large dungeons hewn from the native rock. Many Genevese were confined here for expressing their views too freely, among them François de Bonivard, Prior of St Victor's in Geneva. He was incarcerated here by the Duke of Savoy in 1530, fettered to an iron ring which is still shown to visitors, but was released in 1536 when Bernese conquered Vaux and, with the help of ships from Geneva, took the castle. He is the hero of Byron's poem "The Prisoner of Chillon" (1816). Other illustrious poets and writers such as Victor Hugo, Rodolphe Töpffer and Juste Olivier have written about the castle. Nowadays it is hard to distinguish the 25 buildings that make up Chillon castle, closely grouped around three courtyards; the oldest being the keep and the Duke's Tower, which are linked by an internal wall, the square tower, which dominates the entrance and the living quarters.