Once across the Vienne banners were unfurled and the character of the campaign changed. Bourges, where the declared objective of the prince was to join the count of Poitiers in battle, was about 125 miles away in a direct line. The countryside in between was generally easy going and the prince could be there in a week if he so chose. A campaign of destruction might draw out the count of Poitiers or perhaps King Jean could be drawn south. The previously cautious approach was now set aside, and the itinerary becomes a catalogue of towns and castles taken and destroyed.

The route to Lesterps, ten miles beyond the river Vienne, would certainly have taken the army through St-Maurice-des-Lyons. From the thirteenth century Lesterps had been defended with walls and ditches. There was a fortified Augustinian abbey, also walled with an internal gate to the town, forming an integral part of Lesterps. After the soft, honey-coloured sandstone prevalent during the march north to the Vienne, the hard, grey granite of the Massif Central now begins to predominate and is evident in the vestiges of the town walls and the remaining thirteenth-century houses.