Former Jesuit College

place of culture and meeting

Beneath your eyes, it plants the imposing brick setting at the edge of the city, embroidered with those two great staircases and harmoniously welded to the Chapel of St. Joseph.

Patient, Penelope all dressed in bronze, eternally watches over this place where the many lives that have animated it still resonate…

History of the building

A receiver of the sizes in Quercy was the first owner of this residence that he built with taste. Ambitious, the Hôtel de Colomb did not stop there! It expanded by buying out the houses in the vicinity and building the chapelSaint-Joseph.

For 20,000 pounds, the Jesuits acquired the building in 1676. The walls recall the 300 students who occupied its benches, beginning in 1701, when it became a place of learning. This college was reserved mainly for the sons of Protestant families, subjected to a strictly Catholic education.

During the Revolution, the building became a foundry, 358 cannons would be made here, for the armies of the Republic.

During the Second Empire, the college became a high school for boys under the action of the Bonapartist mayor of the time, Adrien Prax-Paris.

Today, the building houses the CIAP, the Office de Tourisme, the direction of Cultural Development of the City of Montauban and the dance conservatory.

Some dates to remember

Want to know more?

Go to the CIAP

website