Château de la Motte, Medieval castle in Joué-du-Plain, Normandy, France

Château de la Motte is a castle in Normandy built on medieval fortification foundations near Joué-du-Plain. The stone structure is approached through a long avenue of chestnut trees and displays architectural layers from different building periods.

A Viking motte-and-bailey castle stood on the wooded mound beside the present house; the site is first mentioned in a 1217 letter from Guillaume Lesor asking to become a vassal of the French king. The Ango family built much of the château in the late 16th and early 18th centuries after buying it from the Montgomery descendants. The Deschamps family restored it after the Revolution, and today's building dates from the early 1820s.

The name comes from the wooded mound beside the present house, a motte or earthen castle mound left by the Viking/Norman fortification. The château keeps a motte castrale, a glacière, moats and a belvédère, and its 17th-century outbuildings were built under Louis XIV by architects from Argentan who worked on the Place de la Concorde.

The château is private and not open to visitors; the 900-metre chestnut avenue linking Joué-du-Plain and Écouché, fully replanted in 2017, is the part of the estate that can be walked. The grounds, moat, ice house and 17th-century outbuildings are seen from outside only. Approach by the D2 road through Joué-du-Plain; the nearest rail access is via Argentan.

During World War II, the castle served as both a dairy and a hidden refuge for the Resistance movement. The property secretly sheltered Allied pilots and stored military equipment, revealing its dual purpose during that period.