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118 county of Anjou. It has already been seen how under the two counts, Fulk Nerra (987-1040) and Geoffrey Martel (1040-1060), the county of Anjou, spreading beyond its frontiers on all sides, had been steadily enlarged at the expense of its neighbours. The count's authority was everywhere strong and respected, and as he had his lay vassals and clergy well in hand, they had a general awe of him. And yet the germs of disintegration were already present. Indeed, in order to provide for the protection of their territories, and above all to have a basis of attack against their neighbours, the counts of Anjou had, from the end of the tenth century, been led to cover their country with a network of strongholds. But to construct the great stone keeps (donjons) which at that time were beginning to take the place of mere wooden buildings, and to guard them, time, men and money were needed. Therefore, quite naturally, the counts had not hesitated to grant them out as fiefs, leaving to their vassals the task of completing and defending them. As a result, within a short time, the county had come to be filled, not merely with castles, but with a multitude of lords-castellans handing on the domain and the fortress from father to son.

In this way, Fulk Nerra, about 994, built the castle of Langeais, and almost immediately we note that Langeais becomes the seat of a new feudal family. Hamelin I, lord of Langeais, comes into view about 1030, and when he dies [c. 1065] his fief passes to his descendants. A few years after Fulk built the castle of Montrevault, and immediately invested Stephen, brother-in-law of Hubert, the late Bishop of Angers, with it. Here again a new lordship had been founded, as Stephen had married his daughter Emma to Raoul, Viscount of Le Mans, who succeeded his father-in-law, and took the title of Viscount of Grand Montrevault, while close by, on land which had also been received as a fief from Fulk Nerra by a certain Roger the Old, the fortress and family of Petit Montrevault had grown up. About the same time Fulk had founded the castle of Montreuil-Bellay, and again he had without delay enfeoffed it to his vassal Bellay. A little later Geoffrey Martel had built the castles of Durtal and Mateflon and enfeoffed them to two of his knights. In the same way lords-castellans had been installed at Passavant before 1026; at Maulevrier, at Faye-la-Vineuse, at Sainte-Maure and at Trèves before 1040, all of these being castles built by the count. Everywhere great families had arisen: here, that of Briollay who had received the castle as a fief from Fulk Nerra, there, that of Beaupréau, founded by Jocelyn of Rennes, a soldier of fortune, no doubt singled out by Fulk Nerra. At this time also had their origin the houses of Chemillé, of Montsoreau, of Blaison, of Montjean, of Craon, of Jarzé, of Rillé, of Thouarcé and others. Established in their castles, which secured to them the dominion of the surrounding flat country, and by that very fact, forming a higher class among the barons, daily strengthening their position by the marriages