Domme is a quintessential bastide town. It was built around 1280 as a square, walled town that could be held against marauding armies. It was occupied by various sides in the hundred years war and during the wars of religion. It is perched high on a bluff, 500 feet above a bend in the Dordogne.

Bastide towns, unlike other villages of the period, were built on a square plan with streets that intersect at right angles. The two main streets pass through the city gates in the center of each of the four walls, and meet in a large square in the center of town where the market and the Church stand.