Lot-et-Garonne: under the Ancien Régime, ovens and mills were an important source of income

They were essential for food, to the point of being targeted in times of war

With its many hills and its equally abundant hydraulic network, Lot-et-Garonne is largely endowed with vestiges, in more or less good condition, of these picturesque utilitarian buildings from another era: nearly 500 windmills, almost a thousand watermills, but also, less visible, the ovens. They were above all essential tools to provide the human species with its basic food: bread. Without them, there would be no life.

In times of war, the soldiery did not fail to attack the mills, some of which, like that of Barbaste, were understandably reminiscent of fortresses. While the State levied (among other things) its taxes on salt, nobles and bourgeois reserved the right to tax ovens and mills to ensure comfortable incomes. A visit to old fortified castles, notably that of Biron in the Lot, reveals to us the "communal oven," meaning that the lord of the place reserved the monopoly on baking bread. The oven was made available to the commoner, but on the condition that he paid for its use.

Before cooking, the grain had to be ground. The principle is simple: as early as prehistoric times, our distant ancestors had invented the technique of crushing it between two stones. This technique was perfected with rotating millstones, powered by wind or water. The difference is that the wind does not always blow, while the flow of rivers and streams continues its course, even with a reduced flow in the event of a drought. It was still necessary to have a suitable construction, built partially in the water.

For streams, it was still easy, but when it came to the Garonne, the Lot , or the Baïse, it was a different story. Only those who already possessed wealth could embark on such an investment. But it was particularly profitable, and many bourgeois or aristocratic families, sometimes religious communities, saw this as a most lucrative investment.

The study on the mills of Lot-et-Garonne published in 2003 by Philippe Issandou and Jean Cubelier de Beynac (1) gives us some examples of these wise lords, even of these abbey priors, entrepreneurs before their time, who took up the challenge: the dam of Saint-Vite, near Fumel, dates from 1283; the abbey of Eysses built the mill of Gajac even before the foundation of the bastide of Villeneuve; from the ^11th century, the monks of Moirax built two mills; in 1288, the lords of Castelmoron joined forces with the Templars to share the income from the Temple mill; that of Buzet-sur Baïse, which dates back to very ancient times, belonged to the Marquis of Flamarens.

Its industrial destiny did not end with the invention of steam, since in the aftermath of the First World War, it was transformed into a pencil factory by a Franco-Belgian company, Franbel, whose activity, until the end of the 1950s, employed up to 350 people, for production sold throughout France.

Perhaps because they are located at the confluence of the Lot and Garonne rivers, the two mills of Aiguillon were of prime importance. Records mention their existence in the ^13th century. They were rebuilt in 1603 by Madame de Monpezat, requiring 4,000 days of work. It was the Duke of Aiguillon (1720-1788) who gave them their impressive size, which remains today.

Minister of Louis XV, Emmanuel-Armand de Vignerot had previously been governor of Brittany, where he had proven himself an incomparable builder, creating roads, urbanizing unsanitary towns, and developing ports. At Aiguillon, he did not just build the castle or remodel the old medieval town: he also set about expanding and modernizing his mills on the Lot. It must be said that they brought him the tidy sum of 36,000 livres each year, the equivalent of around one million euros.

Bread ovens, windmills, watermills, let us look with tenderness at their moving vestiges, because nothing remains, alas, of the ship mills, these true floating fortresses, equipped with paddle wheels, less expensive than solid constructions, but just as effective both for grinding and for bringing in taxes. That of the Agen family of Sevin, in the ^16th century, during the Wars of Religion, served Marshal Monluc as an instrument of combat: he cut its moorings so that the drifting ship could go to Port-Sainte-Marie to demolish the pontoon bridge that the Protestant Coligny had just built.

(1) “Water and windmills of Lot-et-Garonne”, Fanlac editions, 2003.