The story of this place
Rising from a rock on Lake Geneva's shore, Chillon guarded the strategic road between Burgundy and the Alpine passes for the Counts and Dukes of Savoy from the 12th century. Its vaulted dungeon held François Bonivard, a Genevan prior chained to a pillar from 1532 to 1536 for defying Savoy. In 1816 Lord Byron toured the cell, was moved to write 'The Prisoner of Chillon,' and scratched his name into the third pillar—still visible today. Captured by Bernese forces in 1536, the fortress became a Vaud arsenal and later Switzerland's most visited historic monument.