Commanderie de Sours, Medieval commandry in Sours, France

The Commanderie de Sours is a former Templar commandry in the centre of Sours, Eure-et-Loir, now split by the rue de la Commanderie, the rue du Clos de Brye and the Place de Verdun into several private and farm properties. Its round stone tower, once a keep and later a pigeon loft, has a conical roof topped by a cross; a chapel doorway carries a sculpture of a turbaned helmet, and on the Place de Verdun stand the remains of a twin-arched gate with a torus and crenellations, its second arch demolished before 1900.

In 1191 Alix de France, countess of Blois and Chartres, gave her residence at Sours to the Templars after her husband Thibaut V died, and they founded a chapel there. The commandry became one of the largest in the Chartres region. After the Templars' arrest under Philip the Fair, the order was suppressed in 1312 and the estate passed to the Hospitallers, who held it until the French Revolution.

The name Sours comes from the estate where Alix de France, countess of Blois and Chartres, held regency for her son in 1191 before giving the residence to the Templars. The commandery was run by a commander with a community of brothers, knights and affiliates. On Place de Verdun, the chapel door carries a sculpture of a turbaned helmet.

The estate is located in central Sours and can be easily reached via Rue de la Commanderie. The site is walkable, and you can explore the different areas of the complex on foot.

The claim that tunnels ran from Sours to the château de Sours or Chartres cathedral is reported as a tradition, not a fact: Alain Lameyre's Guide de la France templière notes it as something people assert. Only the entrance and first metres of the souterrains are visible today, and they are walled off.