The Malbec capital — Pont Valentré's three towers and the Lot river loop
Cahors sits inside an almost complete meander of the Lot river — three sides of the city are enclosed by water, giving it a natural moat. The city is famous for two things: the Pont Valentré, a 14th-century fortified bridge with three towers that is one of the finest surviving medieval military bridges in Europe; and Cahors Malbec wine, the original tannic black wine of southwest France that spawned Argentina's most famous varietal. The old city has a remarkable stock of medieval and Renaissance townhouses.
Cahors was the capital of the Quercy region and one of the most important cities in medieval France — in the 13th century it was a major banking centre ('Cahorsin' was a synonym for banker/usurer across Europe). Pope John XXII, who reorganised the Vatican papacy at Avignon, was born in Cahors in 1245. The city was devastated in the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of Religion; it never fully recovered its medieval importance. The Pont Valentré (begun 1308) was built to defend against English attack and took 70 years to complete.