After a fair bit of graft and with some help from good friends Pieter and Andrea, this beautiful room is finished, it’s the biggest room in our house with a wonderful high ceiling and massive fireplace. We have painted it in a soft blue/grey limewas
h, the plaster work was in bad shape and Pieter, our dear friend from Holland helped me rebuild the damaged walls and ceilings. 2 years ago Pieter’s wife Jet helped Cheri with our Chambre 2 – Marie Antionette. 
Andrea our lovely Scottish friend from LeBugue made the fabulous curtains and we have furnished the room simply, but with nice pieces of furniture. With wide views over the river and the church this room will be a hit with our guests. This end of the house is the oldest part of the existing structure, and sits over a cobbled cellar that runs parallel to Porte del Marty, the stone bastide gate on our property which was the main entrance from the river.
I have since found the remains of a Roman floor in our cellar which was underneath an existing cobbled area. The original building on our property was built in Roman times then rebuilt around the 4th or 5th century by a family line of Chevaliers who ran the village of Diolindum ,which became LaLinda in Occitane then more laterly Lalinde in French. When the new bastide town was built in Lalinde in the 1200’s there was only the cellar, main walls and a shell remaining of the original Chevaliers structure. As most records were lost during the 2 x 100 year wars in our area, there is little documented information left. Our local Mairie ( Mayors Office ) has some documents covering one of our Chevaliers ruling on a property matter in the 7th century plus details of the remains of the building when the bastide walls were built around our house. The first church of Lalinde was built during the Chevaliers time and was part of our property, in this time the church was as much a place of refuge and a meeting hall.
