The Saint-Hubert chapel

What you are looking at

It is tiny — two rooms, an oratory really — and it survived the demolition of the rest of the château because it was attached to the parapet rather than to the wings that came down. That accident of position is why the best-preserved Gothic thing on the site sits next to the terrace rather than inside the Logis.

The carved lintel over the door is the piece to stop at before you go in: a hunting scene showing Saint Hubert kneeling before a stag with a crucifix between its antlers, and beside it Charles VIII and Anne of Brittany at prayer. Almost everyone walks under it looking at their phone.

Inside

Cool, dim, and much smaller than the photographs suggest. The stained glass is nineteenth and twentieth century, replacing what was lost, and it shows scenes from the life of Saint Louis. On the floor to the right is the slab: ICI ONT ÉTÉ DÉPOSÉS LES RESTES PRÉSUMÉS DE LÉONARD DE VINCI — the presumed remains. The word “presumed” is doing a great deal of work, and the reasons are here.

There is usually a small crowd by the slab and nobody at all looking at the vaulting. Give the vaulting thirty seconds; it is a fine piece of late Gothic work squeezed into a room the size of a large bedroom.

How long it takes

Five minutes, ten if it is busy and you wait for a clear view of the slab. In an hour-long visit it is the one place I would go first, because it fills and empties in waves as the guided visits pass through. The order I recommend is on what to see.

What there is to book

Not the entrance ticket — that is bought at the château’s own desk when you arrive. What is bookable is the guiding, and the day trips that include entry to Amboise along with the other Loire châteaux.

Frequently asked questions