The Church of St. Armel, a reconstruction of 1511-1602, is in parts highly decorated with stone sculptures and strange images, recalling, says an ingenious, but profane, Frenchman, the “pleasantries of Rabelais.” Of course he refers to the players on the bagpipes, the man sewing up the mouth of his wife, and the wife tearing off her husband’s cap. Certainly these quaint figures are not born of religious symbolism, unless, by chance, that the symbolism of the religious builders of Ploërmel differs greatly from that of others elsewhere.
There are still remains of Ploërmel’s old city walls dating from the fifteenth century, and also a fragment of a tower.
Near by, on the road to Josselin, is a simple granite shaft perpetuating the famous “Battle of the Thirty,” celebrated in history.
According to Froissart, Robert of Beaumanoir, chatelain of Josselin, one day provoked an English captain—Bromborough—who was encamped at Ploërmel, and challenged him to battle; thirty of his men against thirty Frenchmen. At the first attack four Frenchmen and two English fell. Then the combat began again with swords, battle-axes, and lances. Eight English only finally remained, including Bromborough himself; all the others were killed or taken prisoners and led away to the dungeons of the Château de Josselin.
Froissart writes elsewhere of this same engagement: “Twenty-two years after the battle of the thirty, I saw at the table of King Charles of France one of the combatants, a knight called Yvain Charnel. His face showed that the battle had been hot, for it was scarred all over.”
This wayside column or pyramid just off the route bears the following inscription:
