At the start of the Hundred Years' War, the abbey was concerned with protecting itself. The abbey's chronicles tell us that, in 1347, Saint-Denis began "to create defensive ditches in the vicinity of the town". The ditch discovered during an archaeological dig in the Saint-Remi quarter probably dates from this period. Starting in 1356, the abbot and the regent Charles-the future Charles V-joined forces to build a city wall. Ten years later, however, the town was still not defensible. The king thus ordered the outlying suburb of Saint-Remi to be demolished. The town retrenched behind a smaller perimeter wall. It surrounded the monastic town, Saint-Marcel and the Estrée neighborhood, but left out Saint-Nicolas-des-Aulnes, Saint-Remi and the major portion of the abbey's orchard, La Couture, which was surrounded only by a simple wall. The town's new wall featured five gate-towers, providing access to the principal roads.