Rougnac

Rougnac ( Occitan: Ronhac ) is a municipality with 434 inhabitants (as of January 1, 2011 ) in the Charente region of France in the Poitou -Charentes.

Location

Rougnac lies at an altitude of about 170 meters above sea level. inst about 26 km ( driving distance ) south-east of Angoulême in the ancient cultural landscape of the Angoumois. The small stream Manore flows through the municipal area.

Demographics

Had the church in the first half of the 19th century was still well over 1,000 inhabitants, the population then dropped steadily from the lows of the last decades due to the phylloxera crisis in the wine and the mechanization of agriculture.

Economy

The inhabitants of Rougnac lived for centuries on the principles of self-sufficiency from agriculture; Markets were much too far away. The soils of the community are highly forested ( Forêt d' nurseries ); However, they are still theoretically to the Bons Bois of the vineyard Cognac, but the paragraphs in expensive brandies and even with wine in recent decades tended to shrink, so that the wine is no longer important. Revenue from tourism, especially the rental of apartments ( gîtes ), are become much more important since the 1960s.

History

The still partly originating from Pre-Romanesque parish church time points to a long settlement period of the place. In the Middle Ages led a branch line of the pilgrimage through the town.

Attractions

• Parts of the built from largely unprocessed quarry stone longhouse walls of the parish church ( Église Saint- Pierre ) date back to pre-Roman times. A large, sharpened at the apex of the chancel arch separates the area covered by an open wooden roof nave of the newly designed in the 15th century and provided with a flat closing zweifenstrigen and rip vaulted apse choir area. In the exterior of the church was banked by a roughly simultaneously added crossing tower. Under the entire length of the church extends a precisely hewn from limestone brick perfectly and therefore possibly not until the 13th century attributable elongated barrel-vaulted undercroft, which served the lords of the Château du Repaire as a private chapel. The church is recognized as a monument historique since 2001.
• Just outside the resort (45 ° 32 ' 27 " N, 0 ° 21' 56 " O45.5408333333330.36555555555556 ) is the dominated by a powerful late medieval round tower Château du Repaire. The idyllic artistic site is privately owned and is recognized as a monument historique since 1997.