Step 1
Welcome to Nozeroy,
little Comtoise town
Everything began the 15th of june 1237, by an exchange. . The Duke of Burgundy Hugues IV, yield his jurrassian territories for closer lands, in Auxone and Chalon-sur-Saône, with Jean de Chalon, cadet offspring of the line of Count of Burgundy. In those exchanged land, there is the valley of Mièges and principally Salin-les-Bains, bringing him great wealth from the “white gold”, the salt.
Jean de Chalon then moved to Jura and establish is home on this hill cover by hazel trees (noisetier French supposed to be the origin for the name of the city). A feudal castle is erected and a gathering is assembled, composed of vassal lords, officials, bourgeois, merchant, artisans and farmers. The first mention of the town of Nozeroy appear about 1262.
In 1386, one of his offspring, Jean III de Chalon-Arlay marry Marie des Baux, heiress of the principality of Orange. The Counts of Chalon-Arlay then acquired the title of Prince of Orange, title who would remain in the family and in Nozeroy, until Philibert de Chalon-Arlay, lieutenant general of the armies of Charles Quint, dead in 1530 during the wars of Italy. The title and possessions of the Chalons then passed to the Dutch family de Nassau.
Explanations:
• Orange, principality created in 1181 by Bertrand I des Baux, acknowledged by Frederic Barberousse. Its capital was Orange, in Vaucluse (south of France).
• Nassau, city of the Rheinland-Pfalz state in Germany, birth land of the ruling family of the Netherlands.