The Tower through the centuries

An exclusive place with a century-old history...

Name: Tour Jarlier
Price range: €€

The building of the Jarlier Tower

In the 14th century, the town of Saint-Tropez was ravaged by new wars between the Provençal princes. In 1441, the governor of Provence entrusted the reconstruction of the town to a Genoese architect by the name of Raphaël Pomazio de Garezzio. At that time, Saint-Tropez became an autonomous republic and a renowned port, especially for its sailors.

The construction of the Tour Jarlier began in 1542 and was completed in 1569. It was integrated into the plan for the defence of the village, which was soon entirely fortified. It is from this period that the Porte de la Ponche, the Tour Jarlier, the Tour Veille and the Tour du Portalet date, which will materialise the four corners of the ramparts.

The Village of Saint Tropez

While the high country was prosperous, the coast remained deserted and barren. Until the 19th century, Saint-Tropez lived mainly from maritime trade and sent its boats loaded with cork, wood, oil, wine and chestnuts to Africa and Turkey on board the famous tartanes. The only way to put an end to the ravages was to restore the town of Saint-Tropez. This place was the usual rendezvous of the pirates and the guards placed there had been so often massacred, that it was difficult to find someone to occupy this dangerous post.

In less than two years, the families involved had raised the old tower of Grimaldus and built their town, which they had surrounded with a continuous wall and largely provided with weapons and ammunition. This wall still exists, it starts from the tower adjacent to the Suffren castle, runs along the port, goes up through the fish market to Jarlier, and ends at the point from where it returned to the castle by following the sinuosities of the coast. It is almost everywhere 75 centimetres thick and on some points, as at Jarlier, 7 to 8 metres high; it is still so solid today that wherever one wanted to make openings in it, one had to use a pick. These respectable defences have made Saint-Tropez one of the strongest places on the coast.

The new village of Saint-Tropez

From then on, the efforts of the Moors and the Catalans broke against the ramparts of the new city. In a few years, the hitherto deserted countryside was covered with crops. This community, a sort of bourgeois oligarchy, left to its own devices, resisted victoriously for two centuries all the wars of religion and the undertakings of Spain.

Silos turned into jails

Initially integrated into the village's defence plan, the Jarlier Tower, together with the two coastal towers and the disappeared fishmonger's tower, form a quadrilateral, surrounded by ramparts. The ground floor of the Jarlier tower was then used to store crops. "Jarlie" in Provençal means a cellar where jars are stored.

On the courtyard side, the façade reveals a few grilled openings: former cells. Indeed, at the time of the revolution, the Tour Jarlier was transformed into a jail (prison). After the Second World War, the commune sold the tower. Restoration work began in 2012 and lasted 3 years, the spirit of the fortress having been preserved!