Construction of the Château de Falaise began in 1123 under Henry I of England, on the site of an earlier castle. William the Conqueror was born at that earlier castle around 1028. The limestone fortress stands in the south of Falaise, in Calvados, Normandy.
It has three keeps. The large keep, begun in 1123, held a hall, a chapel and the lord's room. The small keep came later. Philip II Augustus ordered a new cylindrical keep around 1207, now called the Talbot Tower after an English commander who repaired it during the Hundred Years' War. In 1202 Arthur of Brittany was imprisoned here after King John captured him.
The castle was deserted in the seventeenth century and restored from 1870 to 1874. Bombardment in 1944 left the three keeps unscathed. It has been a monument historique since 1840.
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