Puy-l'Évêque (the name translates as Bishop’s Hill) emerged from obscurity in the Middle Ages when in 1228 the Count-Bishop of Cahors commandeered the village as part of the crusade against the Cathars. The village grouped itself around the hilltop episcopal castle that was then built, suffering considerably in the Hundred Years' War when it was occupied for a time by the English.

Later, in 1580, during the Wars of Religion, it was besieged unsuccessfully by the Protestants under the future King Henri IV. The village gradually prospered, based on the barge transportation of wine downstream to Bordeaux and flour milling.

The Revolution saw the end of the rule of the Count-Bishops and the village was temporarily renamed Puy-Libre.

In the period of prosperity that followed the Napoleonic Wars the fortunes of the village improved greatly, with the construction of a bridge over the river in 1840, the creation of modern road connections to Cahors and beyond in the 1850s and then a railway connection at nearby Fumel in 1869.

In the Puy l'Évèque locality . . .