Category: Paris

In my third post on my continuing series discussing the history of the Château de Versailles, I examined several key events that took place from 1786 – June 20, 1789 in the lead-up to the French Revolution. The post concluded with the evolution of the Third Estate of the Estates-General into the National Assembly, and with its members pledging the Oath of the Jeau de Paume on June 20, 1789. In this fourth post, I’m going to focus on several key events of the French Revolution that happened next within a four-month period between June 23 and October 6, 1789.

Before continuing with the story, I’m going to briefly talk about Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. Louis XVI was not a terrible man, but in 1789 he was in way over his head. He was more naturally inclined to be a scholar than a King, and he was completely unsuited to the political and social challenges of his time. To be fair, it would have taken an exceptional personality to rise to the extraordinary changes that were suddenly sweeping through French society. Maybe Louis XIV would have stood a chance. But Louis XVI was not cut from the same cloth as his great-great-great grandfather. Louis XVI had never been a firm and confident decision-maker, and he frequently shied away from conflict. He was a stress-napper and often fell asleep in council meetings—his subsequent snores did little to endear him with or earn the respect of those around him. He also struggled with his mental health. He had been exhibiting symptoms of major depression since August 1787, which would have only been compounded in June 1789 by his grief over the loss of his son.

Marie Antoinette was even less prepared for the task at hand. Marie Antoinette grew up in an age when noble women received very little education or training beyond preparing them to be delightful, entertaining, and (most importantly) obedient wives. Some women successfully overcame the limitations of such an upbringing—her own mother, Maria-Theresa of Austria, comes to mind—but this was not the case for Marie Antoinette. Her education had been largely neglected throughout her childhood¹. She came to France as a fourteen-year old princess full of charm and eager to please, but she could barely read. It was just as well that political intrigues did not suit her, as French Queens were actively discouraged from taking on a political role anyway. Marie Antoinette was an accomplished musician and a devoted mother, happiest when spending time away from court with her children and closest friends; the death of two children in a span of two years would have been devastating. On the few occasions where Marie Antoinette did try to exert the limited political influence she had, she was harshly criticized. The Austrian princess was not welcome in the French political arena, a message that had been made abundantly clear to her by all levels of French society. Further, recent years had seen Marie Antoinette become a target for the simmering anger that the lower class felt for the monarchy. By this point in 1789, she was the most hated person in all of France. 

On June 23, Louis XVI held a seance royal (royal session) in which he tried to break up the National Assembly. Louis XVI had his court master of ceremonies, Henri Evard the marquis de Dreux-Brézé, relay the King’s order that the Three Estates should meet in their separate chambers. Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, the Comte de Mirabeau, hotly replied: “We are here by the will of the people, we shall only go away by the force of bayonets!” Dreux-Brézé and Louis XVI wisely backed down. On June 24, more nobles crossed the floor to join the National Assembly. On June 27, Louis XVI changed tactics in an effort to appear like he was in control of the situation: he ordered all remaining members of the Second Estate to join the National Assembly (the entire First Estate had already done so). He also acquiesced to the demand for “voting by the head.” However, at the same time he also issued orders for the army to mobilize and gather outside of Paris and Versailles.

Rumours and speculation circulated about the King’s intentions with the military deployment. Was he really a supporter of the will of the people, as he claimed? Or was he about to follow up on Mirabeau’s challenge and violently suppress them with bayonets? There was reason to be concerned, as Louis XVI’s typical indecisiveness had him wavering between supporting the Third Estate and the National Assembly one day, and opposing them the next. The King’s younger brothers and several other conservative royalist figures were urging him to hold firm on the absolutist power of the monarchy and push back against the National Assembly. They also wanted him to fire Jacques Necker, whose progressive reforms and support of the Third Estate as Controller-General of Finance had earned their enmity. 

On July 6, the National Assembly appointed a committee to begin drafting a national constitution. On July 8, they petitioned Louis XVI to remove his troops from the outskirts of Paris. The recent arrival of several foreign regiments, their obedience to Louis XVI bought and paid for, had worryingly added to their number. Louis XVI shrugged off their request, saying that the deployment was a precautionary measure. He also casually suggested that the National Assembly relocate itself to Noyon or Soissons, two cities that were located 100 kms (62 miles) northeast of Paris. But he wasn’t fooling anyone with this gesture. There was no way the Assembly was going to move that far out from the centre of its growing power at Versailles nor away from the potent support provided by the people of Paris. On July 9 the National Assembly took another revolutionary step forward when they reorganized themselves into the National Constituent Assembly, and claimed that they had the power to make laws. (Note: it was common practice at the time to continue referring to this body as the “National Assembly,” but I am going to start calling it the “National Constituent Assembly to help keep them straight).

On July 11 a member of the National Constituent Assembly proposed that France adopt a “Declaration of Rights” based on the American Declaration of Independence. This was Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette, a French aristocrat and military officer who had distinguished himself as a war hero during the American War of Independence while commanding American troops in several battles. Lafayette and many of his French comrades returned from America changed by their experiences there, with new ideas about the role of the monarchy and the power of the common people. Lafayette worked on drafting a French Declaration of Rights through the summer of 1789. He consulted with his close friend Thomas Jefferson, and gathered input from the Abbé Sieyès and Mirabeau as well. 

July 11 was also the day when Louis XVI had Necker terminated as the Controller-General of Finance. When news reached the citizens of Paris on July 12, they became outraged. Necker was popular with the common people; there had been celebratory fireworks in Paris when he was recalled to his position back in August 1788. This dismissal of Necker by Louis XVI was interpreted by Parisians as an attack on the National Constituent Assembly. They were also paranoid that the 30,000 soldiers gathered around the city were preparing to shut the Assembly down. This perceived royal interference with the National Constituent Assembly, combined with Parisians’ anger over the current bread price of 14.5 sous, incensed the local populace. Demonstrators took to the streets. A crowd marched from the Palais Royal to the Tuileries Palace, carrying wax busts of Necker and the Duke of Orléans that they had stolen from a local museum while en route. Although the crowd was unarmed, they started to throw stones and garbage at a small group of soldiers when they reached the Tuileries Gardens. The soldiers were part of a German-speaking regiment of the Royal Army, the Royal-Allemand Dragoons, and half of them were made up of Swiss and German mercenaries. Their leader, Charles-Eugène, the Prince of Lambesc, led his troops as they charged at the mob on horseback, armed with sabres. One person was killed and many were injured, including several innocent civilians. A detachment of the French Guards, a permanent local infantry garrison with strong ties to the people of Paris, fired at the Royal-Allemand cavalrymen in response to their attack. 

This incident pushed Paris into full-blown rebellion. Louis XVI’s mercenary troops had demonstrated that they were willing to hurt people, and the Paris-based soldiers of the French Guards showed that their loyalties were divided. Rumours that the King was imposing martial law spread like wildfire, and Parisians sought to arm themselves. From the afternoon of July 12 through to the morning of July 14 mobs broke into gun stores, private homes, small armouries, customs posts, and even a convent. They beat or chased away any royal official who tried to prevent them from seizing guns and ammunition. One imaginative group broke into the opera house, only to be disappointed when they discovered that all the cannons and guns used on stage were made of cardboard. The French Guard were ordered to quell the insurrection, but they refused to fire on civilians; instead, many of them broke ranks and joined the insurrectionists.

The National Constituent Assembly held an emergency meeting on the evening of July 12. Since the French Guard had failed in their duty, the deputies came up with a plan to create a new citizens’ militia, the National Guard. This new city guard would defend Paris from external threats and maintain order in the capital. It would operate independently of the army and beyond the reach of the King; its loyalty would be with the National Constituent Assembly alone. The National Guard would use the city of Paris’ red and blue flag as its standard; soldiers would wear cockades (a cloth rosette) sporting the same colours. The formation of the National Guard was met with popular support throughout Paris. Within a few hours of its first establishment in the early hours of July 13, several National Guard groups had formed throughout the city. There were a lot of volunteers eager to make up its intended rank of 48,000 men including soldiers from the French Guard. They dressed in the requisite red and blue and assembled at the Hôtel de Ville, where they awaited instructions. Enthusiasm was in readier supply than organization, however. Arms were in short supply, and so the National Guard could only sit back as mob violence continued to escalate throughout Paris on July 13.

On the morning of July 14 a crowd marched on the Hôtel des Invalides. Although the Invalides had been primarily used as a military infirmary, it had a large store of rifles and artillery in its basement. The guardsmen at the Invalides stood aside and allowed the group to ransack the premises, with some of them even defecting and joining the looters. The mob found 30,000 rifles but little ammunition. But the Invalides guardsmen knew where the solution to that problem could be found: 250 pounds of gunpowder had been recently stored at the Bastille. Once the crowd was informed of this, they duly set off on the 4 km (2.5 mile) trek between the Hôtel des Invalides and the Bastille.

The Bastille had been originally built as a fortress from 1370-1380 to protect the eastern city wall of Paris and the entrance gate at the Porte-Saint-Antoine. It cut a formidable profile, consisting of eight towers with crenellated walls that stood 25 metres (82 feet) high above the streets. In 1417, the Bastille became a state prison. Over the centuries it had become a symbol of feudalistic tyranny, although by the 1700s it rarely held more than 20-30 prisoners at a time. The majority of these inmates were not common criminals; instead, they tended to be rebellious nobles, religious heretics or critics, seditious journalists, propagandists, and debt-ridden aristocrats who had displeased the King. There were seven prisoners being held at the Bastille that fateful morning of June 14, 1789: four forgers, a nobly-born criminal, and two men who were mentally ill.

As the mob from the Invalides gathered outside the Bastille they were joined by a large number of residents from the nearby working-class neighbourhood, the Fauborg Saint-Antoine. At 10:00 am the commander of the Bastille, Bernard-René de Launay, allowed two members of this 900-strong group in to negotiate. De Launay was in a tough spot. He had 114 soldiers assigned to the Bastille, but 82 of them were veteran soldiers who were considered no longer suitable for service in the field—not exactly a collection of elite, competent fighters. And although the construction of the Bastille made it virtually impregnable, the prison only had two days’ food at hand and no source of water; it would not withstand a long siege. On top of that, there was not a lot of room for compromise as de Launay had orders to hold the Bastille at all costs. He was not willing to give up the Bastille’s cannons and gunpowder—the acquiring of which was the sole purpose of this mob— so negotiations quickly failed.

At around 1:30 pm, chaos broke out as a small group gained access to the Bastille’s outer courtyard. De Launay ordered his soldiers to fire on the invaders. A frenzied battle took place within the confined space. When news spread that the garrison had opened fire on the people, swarms of additional people descended upon the Bastille. Two detachments of the French Guard joined them around 3:00 pm, bringing with them trained infantry officers as well as their guns. The fighting intensified. The mob found that their weaponry was too light to inflict damage on the stone walls of the Bastille, so instead they focused their cannons on the main wooden gate. For three and a half long hours, the Bastille was under siege. At one point De Launay threatened to blow up the Bastille and, along with it, most of eastern Paris. When this bluff failed, he ordered a cease-fire and surrendered the Bastille at 5:00 pm. The drawbridge came down at 5:30 pm and the revolutionaries stormed into the fortress. De Launay was dragged into the streets where he was severely beaten and then killed; his severed head was raised up and paraded on a pike. The gunpowder and weapons were seized and the seven prisoners released².

There were nearly 100 people killed and 70 wounded during the course of the actual fighting. Only one Bastille soldier died during the battle due to the protection offered by the fortress’ thick walls, but De Launay and three other officers were slain after the fact. The victorious mob then set out on the short 1.5 km (0.9 mile) distance that lay between the Bastille and the Hôtel de Ville. When they arrived at the Hôtel de Ville they demanded to see Jacques de Fleselles, the provost of the merchants of Paris (a position roughly equal to City Mayor); he was suspected of having royalist sympathies. De Fleselles obliged and had just begun addressing the crowd when he was gunned down. Like De Launay, De Fleselles’ head was severed and paraded on a pike through the streets of Paris. Other city officials quickly (and understandably) fled the Hôtel de Ville. Back at Versailles, Louis XVI was already in bed when news of the Bastille reached him late in the evening of July 14. “Is it a revolt?” the King asked François-Alexandre Frédéric, the Duke of Rochefoucauld-Liancourt, who had come to break the news. “No, majesty, it is a revolution!” the Duke replied.

On July 15, electors from the 60 districts of Paris gathered to form a new municipal government that they called the Paris Commune. Jean-Sylvain Bailly, the astronomer who had been appointed President of the National Assembly, was elected as Paris’ first City Mayor. At Versailles, the National Constituent Assembly nominated Lafayette as the Commander-in-Chief of the National Guard. Lafayette had stellar credentials: he was a nobleman, a liberal, and a respected military veteran. He was a moderate leader that all Three Estates, aristocrat and common man alike, were willing to rally behind. While Lafayette was uniquely qualified to have the simultaneous backing of the monarchy, the National Constituent Assembly, and the people of Paris at a time when all three of these bodies were coming into increasing conflict with each other, this also meant that he would be responsible for reciprocating their support. Circumstances would soon force him to choose whether his greater loyalties rested with Louis XVI, the National Guardsmen, or the revolutionaries. But for now, one of Lafayette’s first moves as Commander of the National Guard was to add white, the colour of the Bourbon monarchy, to the red and blue cockade of the National Guard. Thus the famous red, white, and blue tricolour of the French Revolution was born. 

Louis XVI visited the National Constituent Assembly on July 15 at Versailles. He returned on July 16 and agreed to several concessions they presented to him. He recalled Necker to his position as Controller-General of Finance, and ordered the withdrawal of his troops from around Paris and Versailles. On July 17, Louis XVI travelled to Paris on a mission of goodwill to meet with the new Paris Commune. He met with Bailly at the Hôtel de Ville, and was then taken out on a balcony to face a large waiting audience of Parisians. Bailly presented Louis XVI with keys to the city of Paris and then a large red and blue cockade. Both items were gratefully accepted by the King, who immediately pinned the cockade to his hat. Cheers erupted from the crowd below, along with cries of “Vive la nation!” (Long live the nation!) and “Vive le roi!” (Long live the King!). This appearance by Louis XVI achieved what it had set out to do: it confirmed that the French monarch had bent to the will of the people, and the combustible violence in Paris dissipated… for now.

1789 was a long, strange summer in France. There were sporadic displays of violence and paranoia in the capital city and throughout the countryside. On July 22 one of the King’s ministers, Joseph-François Foullon de Doué, was found hiding in Paris. De Doué had temporarily acted as Necker’s replacement, which was enough to earn him the enmity of the people of Paris. On top of that, Parisian newspapers accused him of saying, probably falsely, that hungry people should eat hay. De Doué was seized by an angry mob that cut off his head and pointedly stuffed it with hay, before placing it on a pike and parading it through Paris³. Another man, French public servant Louis-Bénigne-François Bertier de Sauvigny, was forced out of his home in Compiegne and brought to Paris. De Sauvigny, whose duties included securing provisions for the royal army, was accused of purposefully causing food shortages in Paris. De Sauvigny was shown the severed head of his father-in-law, De Doué, before being hanged from a lamppost in front of the Hôtel de Ville. Gouverneur Morris, an American statesman and Revolutionary who was visiting Paris at the time, witnessed the gruesome spectacle. In a letter to Lafayette, he expressed his horror: “Gracious God, what a people! […] Have we gone backward centuries to pagan atrocities? And you talk of making this people the supreme authority in France? Your party is mad!”

In rural France, rumours that Louis XVI and/or his fellow aristocrats had hired gangs of brigands or mercenaries to destroy their crops and property set off a panic known as “the Great Fear.” The peasants took up arms to defend themselves and then embarked on their own riotous mission of looting, burning, and destroying châteaux—ironically becoming what they had initially been frightened of. Property damage was extensive, and a number of people were killed (3 according to official reports). Peasants also sought out and tore up ledgers that contained information about the taxes, labour, and other feudal obligations they owed to their landlords. Nobles were chased out of their homes and, in some cases, ransomed into renouncing their feudal rights. News of this unrest galvanized the National Constituent Assembly. While the Great Fear had begun as a preparatory action against a rumoured aristocratic counter-revolution, it evolved into a demonstration of the strong hatred the peasants had for feudalism.

The Great Fear encouraged members of the National Constituent Assembly to consider an abolition of all feudal privileges, which was first suggested on August 3, 1789. They moved forward into making this law on the evening of August 4. All of the deputies of the Second Estate stood and voluntarily renounced their hereditary privileges and feudal rights. Members of the First Estate were at first reluctant, but eventually they joined in as well by renouncing their titles and abolishing the church tithe (a 10% tax gathered by the First Estate). It was a euphoric moment of liberal idealism that transcended the Estate system. The Assembly formalized these agreements over the following days with the passing of the August Decrees. These nineteen decrees abolished seigneurial feudalism and sought to create a new society that was based on equality and individual merit.

On August 25, Marie Antoinette hosted a traditional party at Versailles celebrating the Feast of Saint Louis. There, she received a group of women known as the Dames des Halles⁴. The Dames were retailers who sold fish, fruit, eggs, butter, cheese, herbs, vegetables, and flowers out of Les Halles, the central marketplace of Paris. The majority of these (approximately) 1,000 women sold fish, which is why they’re also often called Les Poissardes (“the fishwives”). Les Halles was the geographic heart of Paris and suppliers could not legally bypass it to sell elsewhere. As such, the Dames who worked in Les Halles (known as “the stomach of Paris”) acted as the distribution lynchpin between countryside suppliers and urban Parisian consumers. This role gave the Dames a lot of local influence: both royal and municipal authorities knew it was crucial to keep them happy. The centrality of Les Halles allowed the market to help set the political tone for the rest of Paris. If the Dames became upset about an issue such as a shortage of food, the entire city would soon reverberate with it.

For centuries, the Dames had been widely recognized as being representatives of the common Parisian people. At the same time, they also enjoyed having a close symbolic relationship with the French sovereign that dated back to King/Saint Louis IX in the 13th century. They were granted the privilege of an audience with the King and/or some of his high officials several times a year either at Versailles or in Paris. On feast days and royal celebrations the Dames presented the King with bouquets and compliments to signify their approval. Generations of Dames had formally met and addressed the King at least 350 times between 1614 (the year of the previous meeting of the Estates-General) and 1789. However, it’s important to note that the sovereign didn’t always have the Dames’ unconditional support. The Dames tended to side with the Parlement de Paris in times when its rulings conflicted with the wishes of the King. In August 1787, the Dames were furious when Louis XVI suspended the Parlement de Paris and exiled its members. They refused to travel to Versailles on August 15 for the Feast of the Assumption, and nearly did the same just over a week later for the Feast of Saint Louis on August 25. City officials pressed them into doing so, as it would have been too provocative for them to snub the King on his own Feast Day (since his name was Louis as well). Now, two years later, the Dames were present at Versailles for the Feast of Saint Louis once more. The traditional bouquets and habitual compliments were offered, but not as easily as before. Little did anyone know that the Dames would soon be making another journey to Versailles but, instead of flowers, they would be bringing cannons.

On August 26, 1789 the last of the 17 articles of the Declaration des Droits de L’Homme et du Citoyen (“Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen”), the document that Lafayette and several of his peers had been working on, was adopted by the National Constituent Assembly. The articles were brief and their language was clear, universal, and unambiguous. They secured individual rights of liberty, property, freedom of speech and of the press, freedom of religion, and equal treatment before the law. The articles asserted that law and government existed to serve the public rather than control it. They also established that taxation would be paid by all people in proportion to their means—the elusive goal that had set Louis XVI and his successive finance ministers down this bitter (to them) path in the first place. Although this Declaration did contain some gaps and shortcomings, it quickly became a cornerstone document of the French Revolution and of western liberal democracy itself. Its legacy endures today, as it helped inspire the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

During this same time period, the National Constituent Assembly was also trying to decide what power the monarchy should have moving forward in this new political era. Should Louis XVI have an absolute right of veto on legislation, or was the legislative power of the Assembly paramount? On September 11, the Assembly voted to give Louis XVI a suspensive veto —he could delay the implementation of a new law, but not block it entirely. Louis XVI was furious, as he believed the monarch was entitled to an absolute veto. In protest, on September 15 he used his suspensive veto to refuse endorsement of the August Decrees and the Assembly’s Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. On October 1, the National Constituent Assembly agreed in principle to the idea of a constitutional monarchy. They were ready to strip Louis XVI of all real political authority, if he made this necessary. But there was another incident that took place at Versailles that same day that forestalled such a measure, as it prompted the people of France to check the King’s power in a way that was more dramatic than anything the National Constituent Assembly could have devised. 

On the evening of October 1, the Château de Versailles welcomed soldiers of the Royal Flanders Regiment with a banquet held in the Royal Opera House. The troops had come from a town in northern France, Douai, to strengthen the King’s royal bodyguard. Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were present at the beginning of the festivities, but retired early. The celebration got rowdier after the monarchs left, as large volumes of wine were consumed throughout the course of the evening. Several drunk soldiers climbed onto the tables and began to sing songs, including verses from André Grétry’s 1784 comic opera Richard Cœur-de-Lion. Although the tone of the evening was largely benign, the Parisian press was aflame with indignation the next day. Jean-Paul Marat, a French political writer, physician, and scientist, was especially critical of the event in his radical newspaper L’Ami du peuple (“Friend of the people”). He reported that the soldiers had purposefully insulted the revolution by throwing tricolour cockades on the ground and then stomping and urinating on them. In their place, the soldiers had worn black and white cockades—which were representative of the Bourbon monarchy. Marat claimed that Louis XVI had been present and approving of all this provocation. Whether these details were true or not, the banquet was surely in poor taste: many men and women in France were starving, unable to find a loaf of bread at any cost, while these royal soldiers were being heartily fed and entertained. It’s understandable that news of the reception would further antagonize a population that was on high-alert for signs of royal excess and contempt.  

On the morning of October 5, a group of women at a market in the Fauborg Saint-Antoine—the same neighbourhood whose working-class members had taken part in the storming of the Bastille—began to unite in their fury over the continued scarcity of bread. Lineups outside of city bakeries stretched the length of entire city blocks, with many Parisians waiting for hours only to leave empty-handed. The harvest had just been collected in September, so there was no logical reason why there was still a shortage of food. Rumours began to circulate, with their content intensifying as frustrated people gathered on the streets. No food for Paris! And yet, only a few nights ago the royals and their soldiers had feasted at Versailles! How could this be? Perhaps the royals were trying to starve the people into submission! The soldiers had pissed on their cockades, after all! And, did you hear, the King was there? He even smiled and made a toast to them! The outrage was infectious. Someone started banging a marching drum, and the women urged a nearby church to start ringing its bells. More women from other markets joined in, with the Dames des Halles soon taking charge. Other churches added their bells to the growing storm.

The Dames led the women in a march on the Hôtel de Ville where they were joined by other agitators, including men. The crowd swelled until it numbered around 6,000-7,000 people, perhaps even up to 10,000. They demanded that the municipal authorities provide them with bread. The officials handed over the small supply that was available to them, but it wasn’t enough. The group wanted assurance that food would be made continually available and affordable. When the municipal authorities told them that this wasn’t something they could guarantee, the Dames des Halles asked for weapons. Two cannons and assorted small arms were given to them. An idea surged through the group: they should go to Versailles to demand more bread from the King! And then they should make him return with them to Paris! The people felt they could hold Louis XVI more accountable if he was in the capital, rather than at a remove in his palace at Versailles. The idea became action when Stanslas-Marie Maillard, a National Guardsman who had been among the first revolutionaries to break into the Bastille, grabbed a drum and cried out, “à Versailles!” (to Versailles!). The Women’s March on Versailles had begun.  

As this first group of demonstrators began to depart the Hôtel de Ville for Versailles, a new one began to assemble in their place. Members of the National Guard had been dispatched to the Hôtel de Ville to try and contain the mob that had gathered there. Although they were tasked by the National Constituent Assembly to keep public order, a large number of the guardsmen were sympathetic to the concerns of the Women’s March—many of their number were working- and lower-class citizens, after all. Their Commander, Lafayette, was surprised to find that his men were on the verge of mutiny. As the tide of guardsmen turned toward Versailles, they ordered Lafayette to either lead, get out of the way, or be killed. Rather than leaving them to their own devices, Lafayette reluctantly took his place at the head of the 15,000 men as they left Paris. He sent a rider to run ahead to Versailles and sound the alarm. He hoped that along the way he would find a way to protect the King and regain control of the escalating situation.

There had been numerous calls over the preceding months for a mass demonstration at the King’s primary residence, and now it was finally happening^5,6. It took over six hours for the agitators to march the 21 kms (13 miles) to Versailles in the hard autumn rain, with the first group arriving around 4:00 pm and the main body between 5:00-6:00 pm. They were armed with kitchen knives, pitchforks, scythes, two cannons, muskets, and other makeshift weapons. When the women had first united that morning in the market, hunger and despair had been their motivation. As they were joined by more people with varying agendas their demands grew in number, ambiguity, and ferocity. During the march they cheered the idea of dragging the King (whom they called “the baker”) back to Paris and then killing the Queen (“the baker’s wife”). Several women were overheard saying it was a good thing they were wearing their aprons, since they intended to pull out the Queen’s entrails and use them to make cockades. The more constitutionally-minded folks expressed their desire to force Louis XVI to accept the August Decrees and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.

As the demonstrators neared Versailles, they were met by members of the National Constituent Assembly, who invited Maillard into their hall at the Hôtel des Menus Plaisirs. Several marchers piled into the hall behind Maillard and sat on the members’ benches. They were wet, tired, and hungry. The outnumbered and unguarded assembly members had no choice but to admit them. Maximilien Robespierre, a member who was still largely unknown at the time, welcomed the crowd warmly. His efforts helped soften the group’s hostility and contributed to his later popularity. A group of six women were nominated by the crowd to go in to the Château and speak with Louis XVI. At this point, their demands had refocused on the supply of food. The King, who was meeting with his ministers in the Œil-de-Boeuf Antechamber, agreed to speak with one of the women. Louis XVI made arrangements to provide the crowd with bread from the royal stores, and promised that he would tell the directors of two granaries to release all possible reserves. The King then commissioned a carriage so that Maillard and a few of the women could return to Paris and deliver the news.

However, most of the marchers remained behind in Versailles to continue their protest. They spilled out onto the grounds surrounding the Château. In an attempt to pacify them, Louis XVI came out to address them around 6:00 pm. He announced that he was prepared to make several political concessions such as accepting the August Decrees and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen without qualification. Still, the crowd did not disperse. Later in the evening, Lafayette arrived with his contingent of National Guardsmen. He immediately went inside the Château to see Louis XVI where he announced, “I have come to die at the feet of your Majesty!” Many of the men he had left outside called him a traitor, and allied themselves with the group of marchers who had remained at Versailles. Throughout the evening and into the early hours of October 6, the hostility of this combined group reached a fever pitch. Around 4:00 am, they forced open the gate to the Prince’s Courtyard and charged first into the Royal Courtyard, and then into the residence. Chaos erupted as they stormed through the halls, looking for the Queen’s Bedchamber. They swarmed and beat any member of the Royal Guard who got in their way, killing at least two and placing their heads on pikes. Marie Antoinette and her ladies escaped her room through a secret door and staircase⁷, running barefoot to the King’s Bedchamber. They pounded on his locked door, unheard for long moments above the screams and gunfire, before they were finally admitted. They had barely escaped in time. Back in Marie Antoinette’s room the mob defiantly stabbed her bed with their pikes, making sure she wasn’t hiding inside it.

Lafayette was eventually able to defuse the situation by mediating between the National Guardsmen and members of the Royal Guard. The fighting ceased and the residence was cleared of agitators. However, an angry mob remained outside. They demanded that Louis XVI return with them to Paris. Lafayette convinced Louis XVI to address the crowd from a balcony. As Louis XVI stepped outside, uncertain as to what was about to happen, the crowd unexpectedly cried out: “Vive le Roi!” (Long live the King!”). Surprised and relieved by this change in mood, Louis XVI announced: “My Friends, I shall go with you to Paris with my wife and children. It is to my good and faithful subjects that I confide all that is most precious to me.” The demonstrators then demanded a similar appearance by Marie Antoinette. At first, the Queen came out onto the balcony with her young daughter and son. But the mob, still armed with muskets, commanded her to send the children back inside. Several of the guns were pointed directly at her. From the very beginning of the march, people had rejoiced at the idea of murdering the Queen. Their attitude towards her had been more hostile than the one they had regarding the King. They had broken into the Château that very morning and chased after her through the hallways, beating and killing others along the way. Ordering her to dismiss her children and face them alone was fearfully ominous. It seemed like the blood-thirsty crowd would finally get what they had come for: regicide. Marie bravely faced the crowd with her arms crossed over her chest. And then cheers of “Vive La Reine!” (Long live the Queen!) broke out through the audience. Lafayette knelt before her and kissed her hand, a display that further delighted the crowd. It was a moment that had danced delicately across a razor’s edge. The royal couple had been met with positivity and celebration rather than bloodshed and mutiny. Several heads had already ended up on pikes; theirs could have very easily followed suit. Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were undoubtedly relieved to come away from that balcony alive, but they were no longer free. The crowd may have cheered for them, but their directive was still clear: the royal family was going to Paris.

At 1:25 pm on October 6, the royal family began their trip back to Paris, escorted by a crowd that now numbered around 60,000 people. Louis XVI left the Château in the care of his Minister of War, Jean-Frédéric, the Comte de la Tour du Pin Gouvernet, with the words, “try and save my poor Versailles!” He had hoped to return, but his departure would prove final. Versailles would never again serve as a royal residence. The journey to Paris took nine hours with the National Guard leading the way. Loaves of bread were paraded on the points of bayonets alongside pikes with the decapitated heads of members of the Royal Guard. Celebratory gunshots were fired over the royal carriage into the sky. The King and the French people knew fully who was now in charge of whom. Louis XVI and his family were taken to the Tuileries Palace and, ever the scholar, he asked for a book to be brought to him from the library: it was a history of Charles I, the deposed and (ominously) executed King of England.  

Two weeks later, the members of the National Constituent Assembly followed Louis XVI to Paris. They set up shop at a former riding school, the Salle du Mènage, close to the Tuileries Palace. Louis XVI and his family remained at the Tuileries for the next three years, effectively prisoners, as the country tried to work out a plan for governance. Versailles was closed in their absence and left in the care of the township of Versailles. The Tuileries had not been occupied since the time of Louis XIV and was a considerable downgrade from their previous residence, but the royal family did their best to adapt. Louis-Charles complained, saying of the Tuileries: “it’s very ugly here, Maman.” Marie Antoinette replied, “Mon fils (my son), Louis XIV lived here once and found it very comfortable.” A respectful gesture, certainly, but Louis XIV had built the Château de Versailles with the purpose of leaving Paris and the Tuileries behind. Nearly two years after their arrival in October 1789, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette tried to do the same. During the night of June 20-21, 1791 Louis XVI and his family fled their captivity in Paris, but were caught and arrested a short while later in the small town of Varennes. This escape attempt turned public opinion against Louis XVI even further, and talk shifted from the possibility of establishing a constitutional monarchy to abolishing it outright. Further, the National Constituent Assembly declared that with this flight attempt the royal family had effectively abandoned all of their possessions. The King and Queen’s standing quickly deteriorated from there.

During the Insurrection of August 10, 1792 the Tuileries Palace was stormed by the National Guard (for more information on this, see my post on the Arc de Triomphe). Louis XVI and his family fled the palace and sought refuge with the Legislative Assembly (the name for the new governing body that had replaced the National Constituent Assembly on October 1, 1791). On August 13, the royal family was imprisoned in the Temple of the Conciergerie. On September 21, 1792, the monarchy was abolished. Louis XVI and Marie were stripped of their royal titles and referred to as Citoyen and Citoyenne Capet. On October 19, the interior minister of France proposed that all of the furnishings in the Château and its related residences (the Grand Trianon, the Petit Trianon, the Hameau de la Reine, etc.) be sold. Louis XVI was separated from his family in December 1792 and put on trial. On January 15, he was found guilty of treason and condemned to death by a majority of one vote⁸. On January 21, 1793, Louis XVI was beheaded by guillotine at the age of 38.

On April 6, 1793 the Committee of Public Safety became the de-facto government of France as the Reign of Terror kicked into full gear. Marie’s son, Louis-Charles, was taken away from her on July 3. He was placed in the care of Antoine Simon, a cobbler who was tasked with turning him against his mother and into a “proper republican citizen.” Louis-Charles would later die of tuberculosis on June 8, 1795. Marie Antoinette was put on trial by the Revolutionary Tribunal on October 14, 1793. Her verdict was effectively a foregone conclusion: she was found guilty of treason, depletion of the national treasury, and conspiracy against the security of the state. On October 16, at the age of 37, Marie Antoinette was executed by guillotine. Her daughter, Marie-Thérèse, remained imprisoned and was not informed of the death of her mother or brother until late August 1795. She was finally released on the eve of her 17th birthday on December 18, 1795, in exchange for six prominent French prisoners. She was taken to Vienna where her cousin, Francis II, was ruling as the Holy Roman Emperor.

I’m going to pause my recap of the history of the Château de Versailles at this point, with the death of two of its most famous inhabitants. I’ll pick up the story again in part 5 where I’ll examine how the Château began to transition from being a royal residence to a public museum. That post will include the last Louis of our story, Louis-Philippe I, as well as two controversial French political figures who also share a name: Bonaparte. Thank you for reading!

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¹ Marie Antoinette’s mother, Maria-Theresa of Austria, had sixteen children. Ten of them survived to adulthood: six girls and four boys. Of the six who died, there were three girls who died during their infancy (ages 1-3) and three other children (two girls, one boy) who died between the ages of 12-15. As the fifteenth child and youngest daughter of this large brood, Marie Antoinette was not slated to be a significant political pawn. It’s not surprising that her education was neglected, as there was a lot going on in this household. However, a surprising new alliance was made between France and Austria in 1756-1758 after most of Maria-Theresa’s other daughters had already been married off to secure other political negotiations. Maria-Carolina, the 13th of Maria-Theresa’s children and the 2nd-youngest daughter, was actually who Maria-Theresa planned to have wed to the heir of the King of France. But on October 15, 1767 her 12th child (and 3rd-youngest daughter), Maria-Josepha, died of smallpox at the age of 16. Maria-Josepha passed away on the very day she was due to leave Vienna to marry King Ferdinand of Naples and Sicily. This meant that King Ferdinand was still in need of a bride. So Maria-Carolina was sent to Naples in Maria-Josepha’s stead. Marie Antoinette was the last daughter standing, and so she went on to become Queen of France. Maria-Carolina lived until the age of 62, when she died of a stroke in 1814: a longer life than if she had wed Louis XVI instead. However, Maria-Carolina’s influence later extended to France as two of her descendants, granddaughter Marie-Louise (second wife of Napoleon) and daughter Marie-Amélie (wife of Louis-Philippe I), served as Empress (1810-1814) and Queen of the French (1830-1848), respectively.

^2a There was some debate in the days after the storming of the Bastille about what to do with it. Suggestions included having it set up as a monument to liberation or using it as a depot for the National Guard. Others, including Mirabeau, were eager to see it torn down—recognizing the growing value the conquered fortress had as a revolutionary symbol. On July 16 the Permanent Committee of Municipal Electors at the Hôtel de Ville commissioned Pierre-François Palloy, a building contractor, to disassemble it. 1,000 workers completed the task within 5 months. Some of the stones were used to build the Pont de la Concorde bridge. Palloy also took bricks from the Bastille and had them carved into replicas of the fortress, some of which he sold and some he sent as gifts to spread the revolutionary message throughout France.

^2b There were 954 people who claimed to have stormed the Bastille, Palloy being one of them. They received certificates from the National Constituent Assembly in 1790 recognizing them as Les Vainqueurs de la Bastille (Vanquishers of the Bastille).

^2c In 1793, a large revolutionary fountain featuring a statue of Isis was planned for the former site of the Bastille, which became known as the Place de la Bastille. A foundation stone was laid, but the project never advanced beyond that. Louis-Philippe I had a column built there in 1835-1840 that commemorates the July Revolution of 1830 that placed him in power. In 1899, excavations in the area for the new Paris underground Métro station unearthed the foundations of the Liberté tower. They were moved to the corner of the Boulevard Henri IV, where they can still be seen today. The key to the Bastille was given to George Washington by Lafayette in 1790.

^2d Only one of the seven liberated criminals, Hubert de Solages, remained free after the fall of the Bastille. The four counterfeiters (Jean La Corrège, Jean Béchade, Bernard Laroche, Jean-Antoine Pujade) were taken to a new prison a few days later and the two mentally ill men (James F.X. Whyte, Jean-Antoine Pujade) were admitted into an asylum. De Solages was a member of a minor noble family from Languedoc. He had tried to help his 25-year old sister, Pauline, escape from her abusive husband, Jean-Antoine Barrau, by pretending to kidnap her. Their plan failed, and Barrau ensured that de Solages was imprisoned “due to his dissipation and bad conduct” while Pauline was sent to a convent. De Solages lived until 1824.

³ Did Marie Antoinette actually say, “let them eat cake?” I discuss this further in footnote 5 of my post on the Hameau de la Reine. In short, no. Contemporary accounts from French revolutionaries did not attribute this quote to Marie Antoinette, and they certainly would have been happy to do so if she had. She was the most hated person in France. If she had said such a thing, there would have been a big reaction to it. De Doué was merely rumoured to have said “let them eat hay!” and, well, you can see how that turned out.

⁴ For more about the Dames des Halles, please see Katie Jarvis’ excellent book, Politics in the Marketplace: Work, Gender, and Citizenship in Revolutionary France by Oxford University Press, 2019. All information I have on the Dames des Halles (including the use of the term “Dames des Halles” to refer to them) comes from this work. All other sources I have read regarding the Women’s March on Versailles simply refer to the women (somewhat dismissively) as “the fishwives” or “the market-women.” It was very interesting to learn about the very existence of the Dames des Halles, and the prominent role they played in the French Revolution. How easily their historic impact (and that of many other women) is trivialized and forgotten!  

⁵ Just three weeks earlier, on September 13, a bread riot had taken place in the town of Versailles. A baker was half-hanged for allegedly favouring his richer customers with better quality loaves. Tensions were escalating in the lead-up to the Women’s March on Versailles.

⁶  October 5 began as just another normal day at Versailles. Marie Antoinette was at the Petit Trianon and Louis XVI was out hunting. They both raced back to the main residence, arriving there around 3:00 pm—an hour before the first marchers arrived. They debated whether they should flee to somewhere safer, such as the Château de Rambouillet located 33 kms (20.5 miles) to the southwest of Versailles. They chose not to, as Louis XVI didn’t want to be perceived as a fugitive King; he later said that he regretted that decision. Marie Antoinette stated that her place was by the King’s side, an attitude she held throughout their captivity.  

⁷ This was the same secret staircase that Louis XVI had installed in the summer of 1775 so that he could privately visit the Queen in her bedchamber. Previously, he had to walk across the Œeil-de-Boeuf Antechamber where he had to endure the taunts of members of the court. On the night of October 5-6, it was suggested that Marie Antoinette stay in the King’s Bedchamber where she would be safer. But she didn’t want to put her husband or children in danger, as she knew that the crowd outside wanted to hurt her. At 2:00 am she went to lie, sleepless, in her Bedchamber with some of her ladies.

⁸ The King’s cousin, Louis-Philippe-Joseph, the Duke d’Orléans, provided one of those votes in favour of Louis XVI’s execution. He was the same man who spoke up against Louis XVI at a lit de justice held on November 19, 1787 and was exiled by one of Louis XVI’s lettres de cachet. He also marched with the deputies of the Third Estate during the procession of the Estates-General on on May 4, 1789. Louis-Philippe-Joseph changed his name to Philippe Égalité in the fall of 1792. He would later face the guillotine himself during the Reign of Terror on November 6, 1793. Interestingly, he spent a few months imprisoned at Fort Saint-Jean in Marseille before being sent back to Paris for his execution.

In my first and second posts focusing on the history of the Château de Versailles I discussed the reigns of Louis XIV, Louis XV and that of Louis XVI until the year 1783, a few years prior to the outbreak of the French Revolution. In this third post, I’m going to examine how the French Revolution gained momentum at Versailles through some key events that took place there from 1786 – June 20, 1789. The causes of the French Revolution are numerous and complex; please note that brevity forces me to touch on only a few of them. As the Château de Versailles served as the centre of political power in 18th century France, it became the stage on which many of these pivotal activities played out.

Discontent with both royal and religious authority had been building in France over the last few decades. The French people were increasingly ready for a complete overhaul of their political, social, and religious systems. Privilege, corruption, and disenfranchisement are the cornerstones of a feudal system and France was increasingly due for an earthquake. France under the Ancien Régime (15th century-1789) understood its society as being divided into three separate classes, each of which provided the state with a separate service. The First Estate was made up of the clergy, who were considered responsible for education, religion, and charity. In 1789 they numbered only 10,000 people but owned 5-10% of all land, the most of any Estate. The Second Estate was the aristocratic/noble class, who viewed their contribution to the state as being fulfilled through military service and counsel to the sovereign; they were 400,00 in number, including women and children. The Third Estate, 25 million people strong, consisted of everybody else: the bourgeoisie, peasants, farmers, and the poor. They were responsible for fulfilling their state obligation through taxation, industry, and physical labour. The King was not a part of any Estate as he existed outside of them. There were a lot of problems with this system, the most prominent being that membership in the classes was deeply entrenched. It was impossible for members of the Third Estate to advance in this social hierarchy because the wealth, property, and privileges of the other two were legally and vigorously protected. Crucial to our story is that the First and Second Estates were exempt from taxation, so the people who had the most contributed the least.

The Estate system began to show signs of strain in the 18th century. New ways of thinking about society were percolating at this time. The Age of Enlightenment, an intellectual and philosophical movement, is often cited by French historians as spanning the years 1715-1789; these same years mark the beginning of Louis XV’s reign and the outbreak of the French Revolution during Louis XVI’s. The Enlightenment focused on the importance of reason as the primary source of knowledge and included ideals such as individual liberty, religious tolerance, constitutional government, and the separation of church and state. These ideas challenged the fundamental structure of French feudal society, and they would feed the hungry flame of revolution when it began to flicker in 1788.

In 1786, however, it was not yet Enlightenment ideals that were the most pressing threat to the Estate system: taxes were. France had long relied on heavy taxation of the Third Estate, but the financial burden of the nation had now become too great for it to continue bearing alone. French military involvement in the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) and the American War of Independence (1775-1783) were ruinous to the country’s finances. By the late 1780s, nearly half of the total national budget was being used to service debts that had been run up while financing wars and the armed forces over the last century—a rate of 41% in 1788. Years of harsh winters and poor harvests led to price inflation and food shortages. A loaf of bread, the main food available to commoners, rose in price from 9 sous to 14.5 sous—almost a full day’s pay for an average worker. Further, there were times when there wasn’t enough grain available to even make this costly bread. People were angry, starving, and desperate. Levying more taxes on this suffering population was not an option as the Third Estate was stretched too thin.

Several successive financial ministers (Anne-Robert Jacques Turgot; Jacques Necker; Charles Alexandre Calonne) told Louis XVI that taxation reform was sorely needed. Louis XVI agreed, but both he and his ministers faced heavy opposition from the noble members of the Second Estate. The proposed tax measures were seen as attacks on their hereditary privileges, such as their right to carry a sword and bear a coat of arms. The nobility were inordinately proud of their titles, their family lineage, and the vast unique rights (especially the tax exemptions) that endorsed their perceived social superiority. It would be considered a humiliation for them to pay taxes like any regular commoner. After all, someone at some point in their esteemed family had served in some capacity in the King’s military or on an advisory committee at some point, surely. As far as the Second Estate was concerned, their duties to society had been paid. It was offensive to suggest that they should contribute anything more. (Never mind that military spending, and the proud counsel of the Second Estate that had encouraged it, was actually responsible for the larger portion of the country’s debt).  

Louis XVI’s current Minister of Finance, Charles-Alexandre de Calonne, proposed a new set of financial and administrative measures to the King on August 20, 1786 in his Précis d’un plan pour l’amélioration des finances (Precise plan for improving finances). Calonne sought to apply taxation in a more uniform and fair manner, with only the poor being protected from further burdens. It centered around a new land value tax that would be payable by all landowners without exception, even the Church. Calonne also outlined a system of provincial assemblies that would more effectively handle the administration of the nation’s affairs. Louis XVI supported Calonne’s ideas, but both he and Calonne knew that they were going to have trouble getting the measures passed through the regional parlements.

France had 13 regional parlements as of 1789, the most powerful of which was the Parlement de Paris. The parlements had historical medieval roots in the King’s Council. Its members were aristocratic members of the Second Estate who had bought or inherited their office, and they acted independently of the King. The parlements acted as a supreme court of final appeal for the judicial system and each body consisted of at least 12 magistrates, known as the noblesse du robe (nobles of the robe). They were not legislative bodies but they held a lot of power over a wide range of issues, including taxation. Laws and edicts issued by the Crown were not official until the parlements approved and registered them. Although the parlements could not initiate or amend laws, they were able to exercise a limited veto power on new ones. If the parlement refused to register a law, they would publish a remonstrance that explained why. If the King wished to move forward with an edict, he would then summon justices of the parlement to a session known as a lit de justice (bed/court of justice) where he could override the remonstrance and demand registration of the law. The King could also use lettres de cachet—an order that couldn’t be appealed in a letter bearing the King’s seal—to threaten, imprison, or exile magistrates of the parlement in order to force their compliance. In theory, the parlements were intended to work as a check against the absolute, central power of the King. They were tasked with upholding the Constitution and defending the rights of the French people as a whole. This theoretical mandate of the parlements lent them the popular support of the commoners, who believed that the parlements were their best protection against the authoritarian control of the King. In practice, however, the parlements were mostly dedicated to protecting the interests of the Second Estate, as its members were all nobles.

The Parlement de Paris had so far opposed any reform put forward by Louis XVI and his ministers that required the financial contribution of the aristocratic class, even though this was becoming increasingly crucial to the well-being of their nation. Louis XVI and Calonne knew they were not going to make headway with the Parlement de Paris, so they sought a new route to push through their reforms. Or, rather, an old route—one that hadn’t been used in 160 years, since the reign of Louis XIII in 1626. Calonne suggested that they summon the Assembly of Notables. This Assembly was a group of high-ranking nobles, clergymen, and state officials who convened on extraordinary occasions to advise the King on matters of state. The King hand-selected members for this council and, as such, could typically trust in their support. The Assembly of Notables acted in a consultatory capacity only, as they did not have any legislative or judicial powers. But a successful meeting of the Assembly would result in the King issuing one or more edicts based on their feedback. Louis XVI and Calonne hoped that Assembly endorsement of their taxation reforms would pressure the Parlement de Paris into accepting them as well.

Louis XVI named his candidates and the Assembly of Notables duly met at the Château de Versailles on February 22, 1787. There were 144 members present, of whom only two people were not aristocrats or high clergymen. The group included 36 prominent nobles, 14 bishops or archbishops, seven “Princes of the Blood”, magistrates from the parlements, provincial deputies, and city mayors. Calonne presented his reform package to the Assembly. However, rather than providing Louis XVI and Calonne with the obedient endorsement that was expected—the sole purpose of this exercise, after all—the Assembly erupted into debate and criticism. The measures remained too extreme for these members of the First and Second Estates, even the ones that Louis XVI had purposefully selected. What the Assembly did agree on was that these fiscal and administrative reforms needed to receive proper acceptance from the parlements or, barring that, from an institution that had not been summoned in a period of time even longer than that of the Assembly of Notables: the Estates-General, which had last met 175 years previously, in 1614.

The possibility of calling up the Estates-General charged the French political atmosphere in a whole new way. Like the Assembly of Notables, the Estates-General acted in an advisory capacity, with no legislative or judicial power. Unlike the Assembly of Notables, members were not selected by the King. Instead, the Three Estates had the power to choose their own representatives. It was a sensational prospect for all levels of French society, and Louis XVI was soon being pressured to convene it. But there was a reason the Estates-General had not met since early in the reign of Louis XIII: its very existence suggested that the people had more power than an absolutist monarchy was interested in sharing with them, especially the Third Estate. Three generations of Kings had worked to concentrate power solely in the hands of the monarch. After all, Louis XIV’s motto had been “the King rules alone.” His reign had been the height of this practice, especially thanks to his ability to curb the Second Estate’s impulses to strive for more power by challenging his own. But the system he had so effectively established at Versailles to do this had begun to erode towards the end of Louis XV’s reign, and it was proving to be like quicksand beneath Louis XVI’s feet. Calling up the Estates-General was the last thing Louis XVI wanted to do, and he resisted it for as long as he was able.

Calonne, frustrated with the refusal by the Assembly of Notables to endorse his reforms, tried to seek favour with the general public. He published information about the state’s fiscal crisis and his attempts to resolve it, revealing that the 1786 state deficit was 110 million livres. This infuriated Louis XVI and the members of the Assembly. For centuries, the Kings of France had controlled fiscal policy on their own terms—purposefully keeping the details private when faced with a credit crunch. By making the specifics of the deficit available for public scrutiny, Calonne opened the monarchy up to claims that it was weak, fallible, and corrupt. Calonne was dismissed from his position on April 8. The outraged public looked for someone to blame for this financial crisis, and a foreign princess from Austria was the perfect target. It helped that at the same time Marie Antoinette’s reputation was effectively being deliberated by the Parlement de Paris in a sensational trial concerning the Affair of the Diamond Necklace. Although the Queen was innocent of any crime, her image took a severe hit when the Parlement chose to acquit those involved on May 31; a decision that was likely influenced by the political standoff currently taking place between the Parlement de Paris and Louis XVI. Although Marie Antoinette had long been the subject of salacious pamphlets, their hateful nature intensified at this point. It was during that summer in 1787 that people began to derisively call her by the name “Madame Deficit¹.”

With Calonne gone, Louis XVI needed a new advisor to help him in his continued battle with the Assembly of Notables and the Parlement de Paris over tax reform. Calonne was replaced by Étienne Charles de Loménie de Brienne, the Archbishop of Toulouse, on May 1. Brienne was a member of the Assembly of Notables and, in fact, had led the opposition to Louis XVI and Calonne. Louis XVI hoped that through Brienne’s appointment he would bring more members of the Assembly onside with him. But when Brienne presented his measures to the group on May 25, they were also defeated. As a consequence, Brienne had the Assembly of Notables dissolved. Louis XVI and Brienne then wrestled with the Parlement de Paris for months in an effort to get their measures made into law. They submitted reforms in June 1787, only to have them soundly rejected by July. On August 6, Louis XVI chose to force his measures through a lit de justice held at Versailles. When the parlements of Paris and Bordeaux objected, Louis XVI dissolved them on Brienne’s advice and composed several lettres de cachet that ordered their members into exile in Troyes—a city located 154 kms (96 miles) southeast of Paris.

Brienne expected that exile would encourage the magistrates to back down on their firm line of opposition. Instead, the magistrates wrote to other parlements urging them to refuse to register any tax edicts. There was also public backlash in Paris to the King’s behaviour, leading to several protests. On September 24, it was Louis XVI and Brienne who conceded. Louis XVI allowed the parlements to be recalled and reseated. They were cheered by a celebratory crowd when they returned to Paris in October. On November 19, Louis XVI held another session of the lit de justice at Versailles. This time it was the King’s cousin Louis-Philippe-Joseph, the Duc d’Orléans, who led the protest. In response, the King issued a lettre de cachet that sent the Duke into exile and two of his companions into prison. It was around this point in time that Louis XVI began entertaining the possibility of convening the Estates-General in five years’ time, but he would find that political tensions came to a head much sooner than that.

Louis XVI’s and Brienne’s tug-of-war with the Parlement de Paris continued throughout 1788. In January, the Parlement ruled that all lettres de cachet were illegal. On May 3 the Parlement issued a “Declaration of the Fundamental Laws of France” which sought to assert the parlements’ judicial independence. The declaration also contained strong criticisms of the lettres de cachet and demanded that the Estates-General be convened in order to verify any tax reforms. In response, Louis XVI issued two lettres de cachet on May 4 ordering the arrest of two members of the Parlement de Paris. On May 8, he summoned the parlements to Versailles. Using the lit de justice process he registered an edict that suspended all of the parlements and replaced them with 47 new provincial organizations that were more malleable to the will of the King. These measures were seen as despotic, and a wave of protest and violence swept through France. On June 7, mobs in Grenoble and Brittany threw tiles at government soldiers. In July, several provincial assemblies also demanded the reinstatement of the parlements, as well as the convocation of the Estates-General. On July 5, Louis XVI buckled; he made a preliminary declaration announcing that the Estates-General would be summoned at a future date in 1792. He also scheduled another meeting of the Assembly of Notables in November 1788. This time, the Assembly would provide guidance on how the Estates-General should be selected, how many would make up its number, and what voting procedures it would follow.

Although plans were put in motion for the Estates-General to convene in 1792, circumstances in France quickly became more dire. On July 13, a severe hailstorm decimated the impending harvest. On August 8, Brienne learned that the state was unable to meet its loan repayments. An official calculated that there was only enough money in the treasury to fund state expenditure for one or two days. Louis XVI was thus forced to advance the meeting of the Estates-General by three years, to May 1789. On August 16, the government suspended the payment of interest on some of its debts. On August 25, Brienne resigned. Jacques Necker, previously dismissed from his position of Controller-General of Finance, was recalled. So too were the parlements. Debate raged throughout the fall of 1788 regarding the composition of the Estates-General, particularly regarding the number of representatives that would make up the Third Estate. When the Estates-General had last met in 1614, there had been an equal number of delegates from all Three Estates. French society had drastically changed since then, and now the Third Estate wanted to have double representation—this had already been granted to them in the provincial assemblies. Louis XVI and Necker approved of this idea as they believed that the Third Estate would serve as a royal ally. Increased Third Estate representation would dilute the strength of the Second Estate, and so their much-desired tax reform might finally be approved. The Second Estate was aware of this and, consequently, was firmly opposed to double representation.

On September 25 the Parlement de Paris ruled that the upcoming meeting of the Estates-General would follow the same structures and procedures as when it had been previously summoned in 1614: the proportion of representatives would be equal amongst all three Estates, with no double representation granted for the Third; each Estate would meet and deliberate separately; and each of the Estates would cast one vote, in order, rather than having votes be decided by the ballots of individual deputies (“voting by the head”). Each of these edicts effectively curtailed whatever power the Third Estate had been hoping to exercise through the Estates-General, especially the voting procedure. It allowed the First and Second Estates (3% of the French population) to vote together to protect their own interests and easily overrule those of the Third (97%). The Assembly of Notables added their support to the decisions made by the Parlement de Paris when they met for the second time in November at Versailles. Louis XVI and Necker were disappointed with this outcome, so they had the Assembly of Notables dissolved for the second time.

The Third Estate was furious at the decisions made by the Parlement de Paris and the Assembly of Notables. There was a flood of heated political literature that criticized their rulings and demanded both political and fiscal reform. The parlements were finally exposed as being instruments of aristocratic self-interest and lost the support of the common people. The Third Estate pushed harder for double representation and for voting to be determined by individual ballots by all deputies. On December 27, Louis XVI agreed to double the number of delegates for the Third Estate. But he did not remedy the voting procedure. This meant that no matter how many representatives the Third Estate had, double or not, the result would be the same: they would still only have one group vote, and they would be overruled by the two votes held by the First and Second Estates. It was in this climate that Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès, an Enlightenment-minded political theorist and Catholic abbot commonly known as the Abbé Sieyès, felt moved to publish his views on the political situation in January 1789. His pamphlet, titled Qu-est ce que le tiers-état? (What is the Third Estate?), stated: “What is the Third Estate? Everything. What has it been hitherto in the political order? Nothing. What does it desire to be? Something.” His work was an immediate success, and it would soon become a manifesto of the French Revolution.   

The winter of 1788-1789 was the most severe in living memory, with several people actually freezing to death as they made the journey between Paris and Versailles. Food stores were low due to the failed harvest of the previous season. Bread was in short supply and, when it was available, the prices were astronomical. Rumours of an aristocratic plot to “starve the poor” were rampant and readily believed. On January 24, rules and instructions for electing delegates to the Estates-General were finalised and sent out to the various districts. In February, elections for delegates to the Estates-General took place across France. Among the members successfully elected to the Third Estate were the Abbé Sieyès, thanks to the renown he had gained with his influential political pamphlet, as well as a radical nobleman named Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, the Comte de Mirabeau; the latter had failed to be elected to the Second Estate in his country district, but had managed to secure a seat with the Third Estate.

On April 27, the Réveillon riots broke out in Paris due to rumours that wage cuts were going to be made by the wallpaper manufacturer. Members of the French Guard, the city’s military garrison, were hit with stones, tiles, and other projectiles thrown at them by demonstrators. The French Guard reacted swiftly, even brutally, by firing on the protestors. Official reports stated that 25 people were killed, but the actual figure was probably somewhere between 100-300. This response by the French Guard had a severe effect on the relationship between the government and the people of Paris: the government believed that Parisians were becoming increasingly unmanageable, while the Parisians saw that government troops were prepared to use military action against them.

The 1,200 delegates of the Estates-General arrived at Versailles on May 2. On May 4, they were joined by the royal family in a procession that made its way through the town of Versailles. The group set out from the Church of Notre-Dame de Versailles, crossed the Place d’Armes, and concluded their march at the Church of Saint-Louis. The royal family led the procession dressed in their finest. Louis XVI wore a cloak made of gold cloth that was embellished by brilliant-cut diamonds. He also sported a diamond sword, diamond buttons, diamond shoe buckles and the largest diamond in the kingdom, the Regent diamond^2a, on his hat. Marie Antoinette wore a dress made of silver fabric and, in her hair, the Sancy diamond^2b. She wore other diamonds as well, including two of the famous eighteen Mazarin diamonds (numbers 5 and 6). She did not wear a necklace. The crowds cheered for Louis XVI, but pointedly not for Marie Antoinette. It was safe to show disrespect for a foreign-born Queen, but not yet for their King.

The deputies of the Estates-General followed the royal family, and protocol was strict regarding what the members of each Estate were permitted to wear. The clergy of the First Estate wore their ecclesiastical dress. The nobility of the Second Estate wore black silk and white breeches with lace cravats and plumed hats; they carried swords to denote their rank. The Third Estate wore plain black and were forbidden to carry swords. Louis XVI’s troublesome cousin Louis-Philippe-Joseph, the Duc d’Orléans, decided to walk with the deputies of the Third Estate. This provocative act earned him cheers from the crowd—and the resentment of the King. At the Church of Saint-Louis a High Mass was held by Monseigneur de la Fare, the Bishop of Nancy. The Bishop seized the chance to deliver a now-famous sermon that severely rebuked the luxury of the court. Louis XVI fell asleep during the service (a typical reaction of his in times of stress), and Marie Antoinette pressed her lips together. The Bishop was applauded at the conclusion of his speech. The congregation’s applause was noteworthy, as it quite possibly marked the first time in history a Bishop’s sermon had been received in such a manner.

At long last the 1,200 delegates of the Estates-General finally convened on May 5, 1789 in a temporary hall at Versailles that had been built behind the Hôtel des Menus Plaisirs³. This event is often considered to be the opening act of the French Revolution. The King and his family were seated at the end of the hall beneath a baldachin, with the deputies seated in rows around the edge. Louis XVI began the session with a speech that reviewed the circumstances leading up to the summoning of the Estates-General, and then laid out what he expected from the gathered delegates. He concluded by saying that he was a peaceful king, and declared himself “the people’s greatest friend.” Necker’s three-hour address to the assembly touched on the financial health of the state, constitutional monarchy, as well as institutional and political reforms. His voice hoarse from a cold, he had to quit speaking after fifteen minutes and have the Secretary of the Agricultural Society read the rest. Although Louis XVI and Necker had intended to focus the energy of the Estates-General solely on the matter of taxes, the group soon reached a deadlock on May 6 regarding voting procedure. The Third Estate insisted on having “voting by the head,” as they knew that their single group vote was not enough to exercise any degree of power in the face of the two votes that would surely oppose them. The Third Estate also wanted all of the Estates to meet together and deliberate on issues, rather than being divided and sent into separate chambers. They knew that their best hope to influence the decisions of the First and Second Estates were to have everyone assembled and in discussion together. The resultant controversy raged for days.

It was while the Estates-General was mired in this conflict that tragedy struck the royal family. On Thursday, June 4 the eight-year-old dauphin, Louis-Joseph-Xavier-François, died of tuberculosis. Although the boy’s health had been declining for awhile, his death came at a particularly bad time. Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were understandably devastated, but the delegates of the Third Estate were too feverishly driven by the changing political climate to give them proper time to mourn. They were discovering that as they pushed, they were gaining more power and influence. Their demands were increasingly likely to earn them new rights; if they let up, the opportunity might be lost. Louis XVI was forced to meet with the Estates-General on Sunday, June 7, bitterly commenting: “So there are no fathers among the Third Estate?”

On Wednesday, June 10, the Abbé Sieyès proposed that members of the First and Second Estates join the Third and become a united body to represent the nation as a whole; he further suggested that the Third Estate had the right to consider those who refused this invitation to have defaulted on their national responsibility. On Saturday, June 13, several members of the First Estate crossed the floor in order to do just that. On Sunday, June 14 the royal family retreated to the Château de Marly for a week of official court mourning. On Wednesday, June 17 the Third Estate, now joined by several members of the First and Second Estates declared themselves the National Assembly of France; astronomer Jean-Sylvain Bailly was elected President. The Assembly considered itself to be a legitimate authority equal in power to the King and, as such, they were going to draw up a new constitution for France. Louis XVI’s mourning would have to be cut short. 

On Friday, June 19 the entire First Estate voted to join the National Assembly. On Saturday, June 20 the group went to their usual hall at the Hôtel des Menus Plaisirs. They were surprised to find the doors locked and guarded. Fearing a royal conspiracy, they hastened to the nearest open building where they found a hall that was used to play tennis. Here, led by Bailly, they swore an oath (quickly written by the Abbé Sieyès) that they would assemble, wherever circumstances required, and not separate before they had given France its new constitution. The Serment du Jeau de Paume (Tennis Court Oath) was a courageous act of defiance. It was revolutionary in its assertion that political authority derived from the people and their representatives, rather than the monarchy. The genie was out of the bottle. 

It is at this point in the story, with the creation of the National Assembly and the swearing of the Oath of the Jeau de Paume, that I am going to pause. In my next post, I will cover a series of momentous events that took place between June 23 and October 6, 1789. Thank you for reading!

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^1a The painting of Marie Antoinette and her children done by Élisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun in 1786-1787 was scheduled to be exhibited at the Salon of the Royal Academy at the end of August 1787. But the Queen’s increasing popularity led to fears that there would be demonstrations against her. The Chief of Paris Police, Jean-Charles Pierre Lenoir, advised her to stay away from the capital city. The painting was hurriedly withdrawn from the Salon, leaving only an empty frame. Someone pinned a note to it that read, “Behold the Deficit!” After the death of Louis-Joseph Xavier-François in June 1789, Marie Antoinette understandably found the portrait too painful to look at. She had it removed from the Salon de Mars in Versailles, where it had been displayed.

^1b Court expenditure accounted for 6-7% of the 1788 budget. That’s a significant sum, especially considering the hardship that the majority of the French population was suffering. Still, Marie Antoinette’s expenses weren’t the sole, main reason France was on the verge of bankruptcy—although they were certainly depicted as such. And she wasn’t the only high-roller: that 6-7% includes spending by other members of the court and royal family, such as Louis XVI’s brothers and their wives.

^2a The Regent and the Sancy Diamonds are currently on display at the Louvre. Below are a couple of pictures I took of them while visiting the Louvre. You can read more about the Regent and the Sancy diamonds in this post. First up is the Regent Diamond, which was worn by Louis XIV. It is considered by many to be the purest and most beautiful diamond in the world. It is 141 carats, and estimated to be worth $63 million USD as of 2015.

^2b The Sancy Diamond, worn by Marie Antoinette, shown below. Today, this 55.232 carat pale-yellow diamond is estimated to be worth more than $100 million USD.

³ The Menus-Plaisirs du Roi was a department of the French royal household that looked after the “lesser pleasures of the King.” It was in charge of the preparations for all ceremonies, events, and festivities, down to every last detail. During the reign of Louis XV the Hôtel des Menus-Plaisirs was built in the town of Versailles, near the Chȃteau, to house the activities of this department. A provisional hall was set up behind this building to accommodate the Assembly of Notables in 1787 and 1788. In 1789, one of the courtyards was used to create the Salle des États, to house the Estates-General. The Hôtel des Menus-Plaisirs still stands, and is now home to the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles. 

My first post on the history of the Château de Versailles concluded with the death of its foremost figure, Louis XIV, who had transformed Versailles from a private hunting retreat into a grand palace. In this second post, I am going to discuss the reigns of the next two Kings of France: Louis XV and Louis XVI (until the year of 1783). Louis XV was Louis XIV’s five-year-old great-grandson. It was not an easy transition, as it was beset by tragedy. I’m going to back up a couple of steps to illustrate how this came to be. 

Towards the end of Louis XIV’s reign, his succession seemed a sure thing as he had a full stable of legitimate male heirs (lots of illegitimate children as well, but that’s besides the point). He had a son named Louis, known as the Grand Dauphin¹, who had been born in 1661 (the same year Louis XIV started to take an interest in Versailles!). Further, Louis XIV had a grandson who was also named Louis, born in 1682, known as the Petit Dauphin and the Duke of Burgundy. Louis XIV also had two great-grandsons, both named Louis² , who had been born in 1607 and 1610 at Versailles. Plenty of Louis’ to spare! Or so it seemed.  

Things took a turn in 1711. That was when Louis, the Grand Dauphin, died of smallpox at the age of 49. Then, in February 1712, Louis the Petit Dauphin (aged 29) and his wife, Marie Adélaïde of Savoy (aged 26), died of measles. On March 7, their two young sons were also stricken with measles. Louis XIV’s great-grandsons both underwent the typical treatment of the time: they were bled. During the night of March 8-9, the elder Louis died from a combination of the disease and his treatment at the age of 5. The governess of the younger Louis, Madame de Ventadour, prevented the doctor from bleeding him further. Thanks to her intervention, he survived. Three and a half years later, he became Louis XV (1710-1774, reigned 1715-1774). 

The portrait below is a composite of six generations of Bourbon men and one non-royal woman, Madame de Ventadour, whose presence in the painting honours her role in saving the dynasty. Louis XIV is seated in the centre. The man standing to the left of Louis XIV is his son Louis, the Grand Dauphin. The man standing on the right is his grandson, Louis, the Petit Dauphin. Madame de Ventadour appears on the far left holding the reins of her charge, Louis XV, who is shown reaching up to his great-grandfather. The figures are flanked by busts of Louis XIII (Louis XIV’s father) and Henri IV (his grandfather). It’s quite an honour, to be included in such a dynastic ensemble of men! That speaks volumes as to how appreciated Madame de Ventadour was for saving Louis XV’s life.

Louis XV’s cousin Philippe II (1674-1723), the Duke of Orléans (son of Louis XIV’s younger brother Philippe), served as Regent during Louis XV’s minority. Philippe II moved the court away from Versailles and back to Paris during this time. Louis XV lived at the Tuileries Palace while Philippe II conducted the affairs of the regency out of his Parisian residence, the Palais-Royale (which he had inherited from his father).

In 1717, Russian Tsar Peter the Great (1672-1725, reigned 1682-1725) stayed at the Grand Trianon. He was impressed by Versailles, and used it as inspiration for the building of the Peterhof Palace in St. Petersburg from 1714-1723. 

Louis XV returned to Versailles on June 15, 1722 when he was twelve years old. He was cheered by a crowd as they gathered on the main street leading up to the residence. Both the town and the Château of Versailles had missed the energy and attention that came with being the official residence of the monarch and the French government. Louis XV’s first stop at Versailles was the Royal Chapel to attend mass. He then explored the gardens, the State Apartments, and the Hall of Mirrors. He lay on the floor in the Hall of Mirrors, staring up at the paintings that Charles Le Brun had made to honour the exploits of his great-grandfather. The court followed his example. Louis XV loved Versailles, as it was where he had been born and lived the early years of his life; it was as if he was finally coming home. On October 25 in that same year, Louis XV was crowned King at the Cathedral of Reims. In February 23, 1723 Louis XV’s thirteenth birthday meant that he had reached the age of his majority and the Regency was officially ended. Versailles became once more the seat of power in France.

Louis XV was determined to follow the example set by his great-grandfather. He had the clock in the Marble Courtyard set to the time that Louis XIV had passed away, where it would remain unchanged for the rest of Louis XV’s reign³. As a result, Louis XV did not make many modifications at the Château de Versailles. His first construction project was to actually complete one that had been interrupted by the death of Louis XIV in 1715. When the fifth and final Royal Chapel had been completed in 1710, Louis XIV had architect Robert de Cotte begin work to repurpose the site of the fourth chapel into a drawing room. Louis XV kick-started this project once more in 1722, and the Hercules Salon was completed in 1736. The room was named after the painting that adorns its ceiling, the Apotheosis of Hercules, by François Le Moyne. It was considered the most finely appointed room in the Château due to the beautiful painting and the room’s marble decoration. Louis XV used it occasionally as a ballroom.

Later in 1723, Louis XV became ill. Although he recovered, panic set in among his advisers about the possibility of him dying without leaving an heir. If that happened, the throne would then pass on to the Bourbon-Orléans branch of the family—the descendants of Louis XIV’s younger brother, Philippe⁴. Marriage to a woman of child-bearing age was urgent. A list of possible brides for Louis XV was drawn up. Maria Leszczsyńska (1703-1768, Queen Consort 1725-1768), the daughter of the deposed King of Poland, Stanislaw I (1677-1766, reigned 1704-1709 and 1733-1736), was eventually chosen (you can read more about him in my post on the Château de Chambord, here). Maria and Louis XV met for the first time on the evening of their official wedding, which took place on September 5, 1725 at the Château de Fontainebleau. They were reported to have fallen in love at first sight. Louis XV was 15 years old and Maria was 22. Their relationship was initially happy. Louis XV was flattered to have a wife several years older than he was. From 1727-1737 Maria gave birth to ten children (the first two were twin girls) of which seven would survive into adulthood; one of them was the crucial male heir, Louis the Dauphin (1729-1765). In 1737, Maria nearly died in childbirth. She was advised that another pregnancy may kill her, and so she and Louis XV ceased having sexual relations. Sadly, things cooled between them from this point on. Louis XV barred Maria from family get-togethers, and they would only see each other on public court occasions.

Louis XV remained faithful to Maria for the first eight years of their marriage, but later became a notorious womanizer; one list I found contained the names of 61 mistresses, official and otherwise. He began his first affair with Louise Julie de Mailly-Nesle in 1733; apparently, the experience was so to his liking that he then had relationships with Louise’s three younger sisters: Pauline Félicité (in 1739), Marie-Anne (1742), and Diane Adélaïde (1742). At first, Louis XV was discreet about his extramarital affairs. Louise only became the first official maȋtress-en-taitre (chief mistress) in 1738, after the King and Queen had ended the intimate aspect of their relationship. Maria was still hurt by the affair, especially as Louise was one of her ladies-in-waiting; she would eventually become resigned to her husband’s philandering.

On the night of February 25-26, 1745, a masked ball was held in the Hall of Mirrors to celebrate the marriage of Louis XV’s son, Louis the Dauphin, to Maria-Teresa Rafaela of Spain (1726-1746)⁵. Louis XV and several of his men dressed as topiary yew trees (shown in the picture below, to the right), which led to the event becoming known as “the Yew Tree Ball.” The ball started at 11:30 pm and continued until 8:30 am the next day with 1,500 people in attendance. It was at this ball that Louis XV met Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour, who was dressed as a shepherdess. She became his mistress shortly thereafter. Of all Louis XV’s mistresses, Madame de Pompadour would be the most politically influential. In some respects, her power at court eclipsed that of the Queen, and some have suggested her role could be seen as being a “de facto prime minister.”   

Louis XV continued with the spectacle and performance of kingship that his great-grandfather had initiated, but he wasn’t as comfortable in the role as his predecessor. He was a little more timid than Louis XIV, and so his work at Versailles was directed toward creating more private and intimate spaces. Louis XV renovated several of the apartments so that they were smaller and more personal as opposed to the grand public spaces that Louis XIV had created. The gardens of Versailles remained largely unchanged during his reign. Further, Louis XV didn’t stay at Versailles exclusively; he divided his time between several other residences such as those at Marly, Fountainebleau, and Compiègne.

In 1752, Louis XV ordered the demolition of the Ambassador’s Staircase⁶ in order to create more apartments for his daughters. The staircase had served as an entrance to the King’s State Apartments, and had been built between 1672-1679 by Louis Le Vau. It was richly decorated by Charles Le Brun with polychrome marble, gilt bronzes, paintings, and featured a glass roof. Other decor had celebrated the victory of Louis XIV in the Franco-Dutch War of 1672-1678.

From 1762-1768 Louis XV had a small château, the Petit Trianon, built on the grounds of the Grand Trianon. Louis XV had it designed with Madame de Pompadour in mind, but she died four years before its completion. Her successor Jeanne Bécu, the Comtesse du Berry, became its occupant. More information about the Petit Trianon can be found in this blog post.

The biggest project undertaken during the reign of Louis XV was the construction of the Royal Opera House of Versailles from 1763-1770 under the direction of architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel. At the time it was the largest concert hall in Europe, and could hold nearly 1,500 spectators. In addition to its use as a theatre space, it could also be adapted for use as a ballroom and a hall for feasts thanks to a complex system of movable floors using winches and hoists (for more on the Royal Opera House, see this post).

Louis XV died of smallpox on May 10, 1774 after reigning for 59 years. He was predeceased by his wife Queen Maria in 1768 and his son Louis, Dauphin of France, in 1765. Louis XV would be succeeded by his grandson, Louis-Auguste, crowned Louis XVI (1754-1793, reigned 1774-1792), who was two months shy of his twentieth birthday.

Louis-Auguste was born on August 23, 1754. His mother was Maria-Josepha of Saxony (1731-1767), the second wife of Louis, the Dauphin of France. Louis-Auguste was the third child born of his father’s second marriage, but his elder sister and brother both died while they were young: Marie-Zéphyrine from an attack of convulsions at the age of 5 (1755) and Louis-Joseph from tuberculosis at 9 (1761). Louis-Auguste had two younger brothers and two younger sisters: Louis-Stanislas, the Comte (Count) de Provence (1755-1824, later reigned as Louis XVIII from 1814-1815 and 1815-1824); Charles, the Comte de Artois (1757-1836, later reigned as Charles X from 1824-1830); Marie-Clotilde (1759-1802, later reigned as Clotilda, Queen Consort of Sardinia from 1796-1802); and Princess/Madame Élisabeth (1764-1794). Louis-Auguste was timid and studious as a child. Some of the subjects he enjoyed learning included Latin, Italian, English, history, geography, and astronomy. Louis-Auguste’s parents both died of tuberculosis at a young age: his father in 1765 (he was 36), and his mother in 1767 (she was 35).

For many years, Austria and France had been bitter enemies. However, European power dynamics shifted considerably in the middle of the 18th century⁷. One outcome of such a change in alliance was that, in 1770, Louis-Auguste was married to Maria-Antonia, the youngest daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and his wife, Empress Maria-Theresa. Maria-Antonia’s name was changed to Marie Antoinette (1755-1793, reigned 1774-1792) in order to sound more French. The couple were married in the Royal Chapel at Versailles on May 16. Afterwards, they attended a feast in the Royal Opera House. Louis was 15 years of age and Marie was 14.

The Austrian Archduchess did not receive a warm welcome in France. For generations, the French had viewed Austria as their enemy and the new alliance between the two nations had resulted in France’s humiliating defeat by the English in the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763)⁸. The French public had soured on the French-Austrian alliance and the young Dauphine became the target of that ire. This established a pattern that would be repeated throughout the next 25 years of their marriage, in which Marie Antoinette would draw a lot of heat (and negative propaganda) for the monarchy’s wrongdoing. The relationship between Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette was initially friendly but distant. Both of them were only in their mid-teens, and Louis XVI was very shy; their marriage remained unconsummated for seven years despite incredible pressure to produce a male heir. One of the issues was that there was a significant distance between the King and the Queen’s bedchambers, one that Louis XVI could scarcely bring himself to bridge because it was very public. Courtiers would spot him walking through the Œil de Boeuf Antechamber and there they would point, laugh, and make comments that left him feeling very uncomfortable. In the summer of 1775, a secret staircase was built to connect the King’s and Queen’s chambers (this same staircase would later save the Queen’s life). The couple’s first child, Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte, was born in December 1778. Two boys were then born: Louis-Joseph-Xavier-François in 1781 and Louis-Charles in 1785. A fourth child, Sophie-Hélène-Béatrix, was born in 1786 but died one month shy of her first birthday.   

Like his grandfather, Louis XVI had been born at Versailles. Unlike his grandfather, he spent most of his time there. He enjoyed long periods of solitary study within his private chambers, and any work he did at Versailles was dedicated to making these areas more comfortable for him and his family. In May 1774, two weeks after the death of Louis XV and their ascension to the throne, Louis XVI gifted the Petit Trianon to Marie Antoinette. She used the property as a very exclusive, private domain; even the King wasn’t allowed there without her permission. She made extensive changes to the interior of the small château and its grounds, including the construction of a rustic farm hamlet from 1783-1786 (read more about the Hameau de la Reine here). Neither Louis XVI or Marie Antoinette enjoyed living their lives as publicly as their predecessors. This did not sit well with the nobility, who were accustomed to the previous levels of access that had been established by Louis XIV and Louis XV. Their resentment began to fester, and would later contribute to the royal couple’s downfall.

In 1775, the American War of Independence broke out between Britain and the Thirteen Colonies. Louis XVI sent financial and military assistance to the Americans and, in 1778, France officially joined the war against the British. This conflict became global when Spain and the Netherlands later took part (also in opposition to Britain) and battles were fought throughout America, Europe, and India. On September 3, 1783, two of the three treaties of the Peace of Paris were signed at the Château de Versailles in the Hôtel des Affaires étrangères et de la Marine, officially ending the war. Britain accepted the independence of the Thirteen American colonies as part of these peace agreements. French assistance had been vital and decisive to this outcome, but it came at a high cost to France as its economy was nearly bankrupt. After accumulating over a billion livres in debt, the country was on the verge of financial collapse⁹.

Two weeks after the signing of the Treaty of Paris, Versailles hosted an event that was literally much lighter in tone. Brothers Joseph and Étienne Montgolfier had begun experimenting with lighter-than-air flight in 1782. The brothers caught the attention of the Académie Royale des Sciences, which asked them to stage an experiment for Louis XVI. On September 19, 1783 the brothers staged a public demonstration of their hot-air balloon technology at the Château de Versailles. The presentation used a balloon made of cotton canvas with paper glued onto both sides that measured 18.47 metres (60.6 feet) tall by 13.28 metres (43.57 feet) wide, and weighed 400 kg (882 pounds). The balloon was a sky-blue colour with gold decoration and interweaving letter L’s in honour of the king. On the day of the experiment Louis XVI, his family, and a crowd of curious onlookers gathered in the palace forecourt. At 1:00 pm, a cannon fired to announce the beginning of the demonstration. A sheep, a duck, and a rooster were guided into a wicker basket that was tied to the balloon by a rope. Eleven minutes later a second cannon fired, indicating the lift-off of the basket. The balloon soared 600 meters (1,968.5 feet) into the air. It traveled through the air for 8 minutes and 3.5 kms (2.17 miles) before slowly descending, due to a rip in the fabric, and landing in the woods nearby. Happily, the three animals survived their journey; it wasn’t entirely expected that they would. They were rewarded with a home in the Versailles Menagerie. The first manned hot-air balloon flights would later follow in October and November, but these were not carried out at Versailles.  

It is here in 1783, on the eve of the French Revolution, that I am going to pause in my summary of the history of the Château de Versailles. The events leading up to the French Revolution, and the role that the Château played in them, is deserving of a post of its own, which you can find here. Thank you for reading!  

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¹ The Dauphin of France was the title given to the heir of the throne of France, equivalent to the English title of the Prince of Wales. Dauphin is French for dolphin. The name comes from the Count of Vienne, Guigues IV (?-1142), who had a dolphin on his coat of arms—thus earning him the nickname le dauphin. The name became part of his title, the Dauphin of Viennois, which was inherited by his successors. In 1349, the seigneury/lordship of Viennois was sold to King Philippe VI (1293-1350) on the condition that the heir apparent retain the title of Dauphin de Viennois. The Dauphin’s wife would be called a Dauphine. The title was used from 1350 to the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789. It was taken up again during the reign of Charles X (during the Bourbon Restoration) from 1824-1830. Charles X’s son, Louis-Antoine, Duke of Angoulême, was the last man to be styled as Dauphin. Interestingly, he was married to Marie Antoinette’s daughter, Marie-Thérèse, and the couple technically ruled France for 20 minutes in between the time Charles X signed his abdication and Louis-Antoine was forced to do the same.  

² Why so many men named Louis? It was tradition for the Capetian royal dynasty to name the eldest son Louis, and the second son Philippe. The name Louis harkens back to the Germanic name Chlodwig. A leader by this name was the first King of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one leader, effectively changing the style of Frankish rule from that of several chieftains ruling over multiple groups to a single King ruling over one; his heirs would then inherit his title as King. (The Franks were a Germanic tribe). Chlodwig was Romanized into Clodovicus, and then Clovis; Clovis I (466-511, reigned 509-511) is the name most often used for this Frankish King. Clovis then evolved into Clouis and then, finally, Louis. You’ll notice that a lot of French men were also named Louis and French women Louise in an effort to flatter the King—similar to how there were so many Marys and Elizabeths in England.  

³ The clock in the Marble Courtyard would display the time of Louis XIV’s death (8:15 am on September 1, 1715) until 1774, at which point it changed to reflect the time of Louis XV’s passing (3:15 pm on May 10, 1774). It reflected the latter until the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789.

⁴ The senior branch of the Bourbon family, of whom Louis XIV and Louis XV were a part, later ended when their descendant Charles X was forced to abdicate in 1830, and the Bourbon-Orléans branch would take its place in the succession. Charles X was the younger brother of Louis XVI and Louis XVIII; all three of them being grandsons of Louis XV (Louis XVI’s son with Marie Antoinette died of illness at the age of 10; he is unofficially titled as Louis XVII even though he was never crowned). Charles X was forced to abdicate in favour of his cousin, Louis-Philippe I, who was part of the Bourbon-Orléans branch of the family (and more inclined towards a constitutional monarchy than Charles X). So eventually the Bourbon-Orléans would have their day in the sun, even if it was denied at this point when Louis XV recovered from his illness. The branch is named after the Dukedom (Orléans) that their members frequently held.   

⁵ Sadly, in July 1746 Maria-Teresa would die three days after delivering the couple’s first child, a girl named Marie-Thérèse. Maria-Teresa and Louis the Dauphin were very much in love, and Louis was devastated by her passing. He had to be physically dragged away from her deathbed by his father, Louis XV. He married his second wife, Maria-Josepha of Saxony, on February 9, 1747. In April 1748, the two year old Marie-Thérèse also died. 

⁶ Interestingly, an exact replica of that lost staircase was later built (1878-1886), and can still be seen, at the Schloss Herrenchiemsee on the orders of King Ludwig II of Bavaria; the Herrenchiemsee itself is modelled after Versailles. Ludwig II idolized Louis XIV, the Sun King, and styled himself as “the Moon King” (amongst other titles including the “Mad King”—see my post on him for more information).     

 ⁷ The War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748) saw the major powers of Europe divided on whether Marie Antoinette’s mother, Maria-Theresa of Austria, had the right to succeed her father, Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, when he passed away in 1740 with no male heirs. The problem was that a woman (Maria-Theresa) could not hold the title of Holy Roman Empress and her husband, Francis, did not have enough land or rank on his own to make him eligible. Maria-Theresa had all of the qualifications except gender. Francis had the gender but none of the other qualifications. To solve this, in 1740 Maria-Theresa made Francis co-ruler (with her) of Austria and Bohemia. She then set about securing their joint claim to the Hapsburg Empire and fighting off other powers, such as Prussia and France, that were taking advantage of this political uncertainty to claim pieces of that empire for themselves. A lot of conflict and shifting of political alliances happened as a result. It’s way beyond the scope of this blog post to go into detail, but suffice it to say that Marie Antoinette’s mother was at the heart of it all. In 1745, Francis I became Holy Roman Emperor. While he may have had the title, Maria-Theresa was definitely the deciding voice in matters of state. Great Britain had been an ally of Austria, but failed to come through for Austria in the face of Prussian aggression. Austria realized it needed another ally to counter the Prussian threat, and so it turned to a country that had once been its enemy—France. France was eager to have Austria side with them against Great Britain. Et voilà! The First, Second, and Third Treaties of Versailles were signed between Louis XV and Maria-Theresa at the Château de Versailles in 1756, 1757, and 1758. In 1770, a marriage alliance was arranged between Louis-Auguste and Marie Antoinette to further secure their partnership. 

⁸ The Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) is considered by many historians to be the first global war. France and Austria were soundly defeated by the British and Prussians both in Europe and North America. As a consequence, France was forced to give up its colonial claims in Canada and the Indies to England. Not a popular political move. 

⁹ The rate of inflation from 1783 to 2017 is an estimated 2,212.45%. So $100 in 1783 would be worth (a very rough) $2,2312.45 today. So 1 billion livres of debt would be around 23 billion livres of debt today ($23,124,528,301.89 to be precise). But how much would that debt, calculated in French livres, be worth in US dollars today? This is where things enter pure speculation. According to HistoricalStatistics.org, 1 French livre tournois (1663-1795) in 1783 could buy the same amount of consumer goods and services in Sweden as 0.14621893202721578 US dollars (1791-2015). So 1 US dollar is worth 6.849315068 French livres. 1 billion livres thus becomes 6,849,315,068 livres of debt. Adjusted for that inflation rate, the debt is $158,387,180,138 US dollars. This provides a very rough estimate of 158 billion US dollars in debt. Just for fun, I looked up what the US debt rate is at. According to NPR, as of February 2019 it is 22 trillion. In 2015, France’s national debt was estimated to be 2.51 trillion according to statista.com. But, of course, world finances are very different than they were in 1783. Being indebted is much more acceptable in today’s credit-centric world than it was in 1783.

Of the many sites that Neil and I planned to see during our stay in Paris, I was most excited to see the Château de Versailles. The beauty of its gilded halls and the splendor of its former inhabitants loom large in our social and cultural imagination. The Château has housed a few of the most intriguing, even tragic, French historical figures and has served as the backdrop to some truly dramatic scenes. The Château, its magnificent gardens, and the other impressive buildings that lay within its grounds have earned it many admirers and imitators¹ worldwide. Consisting of 2,300 rooms spread over a distance of 63,154 square meters (207,198 square feet), Versailles is overwhelming, even to modern eyes. It’s impossible to appreciate how fantastical it would have seemed in the 17th and 18th centuries, when it was host to the French court at the height of its decadence and hubris.  

It’s going to take a concentrated effort on my part to try and tell the story of Versailles through a medium as modest as a blog post. In fact, I’m going to use twelve different posts to break down this endeavour. Six posts, including this one, will cover its history: part 2 will cover Louis XV-Louis XVI (until 1783); part 3 will discuss the events that took place from 1786-June 20, 1789; part 4, June 23, 1789-October 6, 1789; part 5, 1789-1870; and part 6, 1870-present day. Two posts will recap our visit to the main residence: part 1 covers the front gates, the Marble Courtyard, the King’s Private Apartments and the Royal Opera House; part 2 the Royal Chapel, the King’s State Apartments, part of the History of France Museum, and the Hall of Mirrors. Four posts will go into detail about the other residences found on the grounds: two will detail the Grand Trianon, with part 1 discussing its history and part 2 a tour of the residence itself; a third post will feature the Petit Trianon; and, finally, a fourth post will cover the Hameau de la Reine (the Queen’s Hamlet). There is a lot to learn about and see at Versailles!

The Château de Versailles served as the primary royal residence of the French monarchy from 1682 until the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789. It is referred to as a château rather than a palais because it was located in the countryside², about 20 kilometers (12 miles) southwest of the centre of Paris. Notable figures in the history of the Château de Versailles include several guys named Louis, each accompanied by a number (XIII-XVI). I’ll go through each of them in turn.

The place name Versailles has its root in the Latin word vertere (“to turn the soil”) and the Old French versail (meaning a ploughed field). The discovery of a Merovingian cemetery south of the Château in 2006 suggests that there have been people living in the area since at least the beginning of the 8th century (the Merovingians were the ruling dynasty of the Franks from the middle of the 5th century until 751 C.E.). The earliest recorded reference to Versailles can be found around 1038 in a charter that contained the signature of Hugo de Versailliis, the seigneur (lord) of Versailles. Versailles was a small medieval village of 200 peasant families that contained a small castle and a church, with its inhabitants living in modest thatch- and slate-roofed cottages. The town’s main prosperity came from its location along the intersection of several roads, including a main route that linked Paris and Normandy. The area was made up of thick woodland and low-lying marshland, with a few orchards and open fields where vines and grain were grown. A windmill once stood on a mound where the present-day château resides. The forest outside of the village was well-stocked with game such as pheasants, boars, stags, hare, as well as wolves. In the middle of the 15th century, wealthy Parisians started buying property in the area. Martial de Loménie, an influential state financier, built a manor house. He petitioned the Crown into allowing the village to have a weekly market and four annual fairs. A Protestant, Lomênie was killed during the Saint Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in Paris in August 1572. His property, as well as the seigneury of Versailles, was purchased by Albert de Gondi in 1575. Gondi was a Florentine man who had held a prominent position in the court of Henri II (1519-1559, reigned 1547-1559) and Catherine de Medici (1519-1589, ruled as Queen Consort of France 1547-1559 and as Queen Regent for most of 1559-1589). Gondi and his family invited Henri IV (1553-1610, reigned 1589-1610) to Versailles on several hunting trips in 1589, 1604, 1607, and 1609. Versailles was located between Paris and the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, a favoured royal residence that had first been built by Louis VI (1081-1137, reigned 1108-1137) in 1124. Versailles was convenient for a day-long hunting trip, with Henri IV occasionally staying overnight in the Gondi manor house. Henri IV brought his young son, six-year old Louis (later crowned Louis XIII), along with him on August 24, 1607. The boy’s first hunting trip here was a success, as he managed to catch a hare, five or six quail, and two partridges.

Louis XIII (1601-1643, reigned 1610-1643) made several hunting trips out to Versailles in the 1610s. In 1623 he purchased some elevated land near the village windmill (which was demolished) and had a small hunting lodge built, which is shown in a 3-D model below³. The lodge was 24 metres long (79 feet) by 6 metres (20 feet) wide. There were four sides to the building, which enclosed a small central court. A protective ditch surrounded the residence. The main wing of the building is the one located towards the back, in the west. This is where the King’s apartments were located. The ground floor of the main wing contained four bedrooms, and the floor above held three rooms and a gallery that overlooked the courtyard. There are two other wings that attach to the lodge’s main wing on its northern and southern sides. The north wing contained the kitchens, service rooms, the house of the concierge, and four spare rooms for Louis XIII’s companions. The south wing contained storerooms, latrines, and four more guest rooms. There were no rooms built to accommodate Louis XIII’s Queen, Anne of Austria, or her ladies. The hunting lodge was strictly for Louis XIII and the members of his hunting party. The fourth and final side of the residence (located at the front, in the east) is not a wing but, instead, a protective ten-foot high wall that contains an entry gate. The hunting lodge and its grounds covered about 2.5 acres. Louis XIII first stayed in it in June 1624.

Versaille’s first instance of starring in a major moment of French political intrigue came in November 1630. Louis XIII’s mother, Marie de Medici (1575-1642, Queen Consort 1600-1610, Queen Regent 1610-1617), had been increasingly determined to get rid of her son’s chief minister (and her rival), Cardinal Richelieu. At the Luxembourg Palace on November 11, the Queen Mother faced off against Richelieu in front of Louis XIII. She demanded that her son choose between them. Louis XIII left for Versailles after the confrontation, leaving Marie de Medici with the impression that she had triumphed. She and her supporters celebrated the apparent termination of Richelieu. However, that same evening, the King summoned the Cardinal to Versailles. There, the two men had a long private discussion during which Louis XIII agreed to reinstate Richelieu and dismiss his mother. The royal carriage returned to Paris with the restored Richelieu aboard. Upon spotting it, a witty courtier named Guillaume Bautru, the Count of Serrant, gave the whole affair its name by proclaiming: “it’s the day of the dupes!” Marie de Medici was ordered to leave Paris for Compiègne. She would later flee and continue to plot against the Cardinal before dying in 1642, still in exile, never seeing her son again.

Louis XIII began to spend more time in the countryside and away from Paris, basing his court out of the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He often made trips out to Versailles, Fontainebleu, and Compiègne to escape the pressures of court. In 1631, Louis XIII decided to demolish his hunting lodge at Versailles and had architect Philibert Le Roy build a bigger, but still modest, château in its place, shown below. The new residence was made of red brick and white stone, and had a black slate roof. In May 1632, Louis XIII purchased the seigneury of Versailles from the Gondi family. Construction was carried out on the new château from 1631-1634. Gardens and a large park surrounding the estate were also laid out. In 1639, P. Claude de Varennes’ Le voyage de France, dressé pour la commodité des François et des estrangers (The trip to France, prepared for the convenience of the French and foreigners) was the first guidebook (of what would become many) to recommend that Paris visitors check out the nearby royal residence of Versailles. By 1643, the grounds of Versailles had grown to cover 312 hectares (771 acres).

However, this second residence was still considered as being “far from royal” and its colour scheme of red, white, and black led to it being called “a little castle of cards.” One of Louis XIII’s courtiers, Duc (Duke) de Saint Simon, wrote that it was “the saddest and most unrewarding of places with no view, no woods, no water and no earth; for it is all shifting sand and marsh, and the air is consequently bad.” The smell was due to the surrounding marshland with its pools of stagnant water, and was especially pungent in the hot summer months. The “puny” residence fell far short of the grandeur of the Tuileries and Louvre palaces in Paris and the nearby Germain-en-Laye. Louis XIII did not mind this; rather, he preferred to keep Versailles as a solitary retreat and rarely extended invites to guests that were not already members of his small hunting parties. Even Queen Anne (1601-1666, Queen Consort 1615-1643, Queen Regent 1643-1651) never spent the night at Versailles. Although rooms had been built to accommodate her, Louis XIII always arranged to have her taken to Paris or Saint-Germain-en-Laye to sleep.  

It would be Louis XIII’s son, Louis XIV (1638-1715, reigned 1643-1715), who transformed Versailles into the grand pleasure palace that it is recognized as today. By the time Louis XIV was born in 1638, his parents had been married for 23 years. They had already grieved the loss of four stillborn children. Louis XIV’s birth was considered a miracle of God, and so he was named Louis-Dieudonné, the God-given. Louis XIV was first sent to Versailles in October 1641 at the age of three along with his younger brother, Philippe, to protect them from a smallpox epidemic that had reached Saint-Germaine-en-Laye. Throughout his childhood, Louis XIV was encouraged to think of himself as literally being God’s gift to the people of France. This would later shape his ideas concerning rule. He believed in the “Divine Right of Kings”: that a monarch derives the right to rule directly from the will of God, and is not subject to any earthly authority. As an absolute monarch and the centre of all power, France revolved around Louis XIV in the same way the earth orbits the sun. Thus Louis XIV identified himself with Apollo, the Greek and Roman god of the sun. His use of the sun as a personal emblem would later earn him the title he is readily known by today, the “Sun King.”

Louis XIII died on May 14, 1643 of illness at the age of 41. He was succeeded by his young son, Louis XIV, aged four. Anne of Austria assumed the Regency and entrusted the government to Cardinal Richelieu’s successor, chief minister Cardinal Mazarin. The French court moved to the Palais-Royal in Paris, the former home of Richelieu. Versailles was abandoned for a decade. Louis XIV returned to Versailles in 1651, at the age of thirteen, where he participated in a hunt. The location outside of Paris must have appealed to the young King, who was in the midst of fighting a series of civil wars known as the Fronde (the Parlementary Fronde, 1648-1649; the Fronde of the Princes, 1650-1653). On two separate occasions, Louis XIV had been held prisoner by revolutionary forces. He was eager to find an excuse to leave Paris behind. He visited Versailles a few more times over the next few years. He took a greater interest in the property following his marriage in 1660 to María-Teresa of Spain (1638-1683, Queen Consort 1660-1683) and the death of Mazarin in 1661.

María-Teresa’s marriage to Louis XIV came about as a result of the Treaty of Pyrenees, which was signed on November 7, 1659. The treaty and the marriage put an end to the nearly twenty-five years of war (beginning in 1635) that had raged between France and Spain. Louis XIV and María-Teresa were first cousins as they shared a grandfather, Henri IV of France (Henri IV was the father of María-Teresa’s mother, Elisabeth of France and Louis XIV’s father, Louis XIII). Upon her marriage, María-Teresa’s name was changed to Marie-Thérèse to make it sound more French (I’m going to compromise and refer to her as Maria-Theresa, which is the name used in most English-language accounts). She was shy, insecure, and spoke hardly a word of French—a sharp contrast to her new husband, who positioned himself at the centre of French political life. Five of their six children would die in early childhood (the sixth, the all-important male heir, Louis the Grand Dauphin, would also predecease his father at the age of 49, but not before continuing the line with a son of his own). Louis XIV remained faithful to Maria-Theresa for the first year of their marriage, but he then went on to have many affairs. Maria-Theresa became good friends with her mother-in-law, Anne of Austria, with whom she spent a lot of time.

A portrait of Maria-Theresa⁴ at the age of 15.

Louis XIV had a greater role in mind for Versailles than the one that it had served for his father as a private hunting retreat. Louis XIV wanted a place where he could gather his entire court around him, something that no other royal residence had the capacity for. He wanted to keep all his advisers and provincial rulers close, so that he could keep his eye on them and prevent them from plotting against him, as they had during the Fronde. Louis XIV also wanted to expand Versailles so that he could host and entertain on a grand scale. In 1661, Louis XIV gifted the Palais-Royal to his younger brother, Philippe d’Orléans. He had no more personal need for it, as he now had a new residence in mind.

Below are two pictures, the first of them a repeat, to remind you what the Château de Versailles looked like when it was constructed by Louis XIII. Louis XIV is about to make some big changes, so I wanted to put them here for easy comparison.

The front of the Château de Versailles prior to Louis XIV’s modifications.

The back of the Château.

From 1661-1668, Louis XIV ordered some building work inside the existing château at Versailles as well as the addition of some outbuildings. You can see these changes in the painting below, which depicts Versailles and its gardens around 1667-1668. These works were guided by architect Louis Le Vau and French painter Charles Le Brun⁵. Louis XIV also hired French landscape architect and gardener André Le Nȏtre to extend the grounds and gardens. You can see that the château built by Louis XIII remains at the heart of the Versailles residence. The foreground shows the new Place d’Armes, a grassy fan-shaped square that is enclosed by a white fence and lines of trees on the bottom of the painting. To the left of the Place d’Armes is the old village of Versailles. In the middle of the painting, a royal procession led by guardsmen on horseback makes its way through the Place d’Armes and through a new forecourt, the Cour d’Honneur, towards a gate, the Porte d’Honneur. Beyond that gate lies the new paved Cour Royale. The Cour Royale features four new buildings. The two larger ones found toward the centre are the Communs, which were built in 1662. The wing on the left (south) houses the pantries and kitchens, the wing on the right (north) the stables. There are two other smaller, narrower buildings that flank the Communs and lie towards the outside of the Cour Royale. They contained the wood reserve on the left (south) and a shed for coaches on the right (north). To the right of the coach shed are three water reservoirs that were used to supply water to the ponds and fountains of the garden. The square building that can be seen on the western (far) end of the coach shed housed the Thetys Grotto (built in 1666), another elaborate water feature. Behind the Château, the vast expanse of the gardens can be seen with the Grand Perspective stretching west into the distance (this later becomes the Grand Canal in 1668-1669). To the left of the Château can be seen the Orangery, which was constructed by Le Nôtre in 1664; Le Nôtre also built a Menagerie, located to the southwest of the Château, which cannot be seen in the painting.

Louis XIV kicked off these improvements at Versailles with the purpose of displaying his power and grandiosity. In 1664, he held the first of what would be many big parties at Versailles. The celebration, entitled The Party of the Delights of the Enchanted Island, ran for one week from May 7-13 with 600 guests in attendance. The party was inspired by an Italian epic poem⁶ in which a magician, Alcina, imprisons the knight Ruggiero and his companions in her palace on an enchanted island. Guests were treated to a rich selection of entertainments that centered on the theme including fireworks, a carousel, theatre and ballet performances, parades, horse races, rides, and a lottery. The party had a program guide that numbered 58 pages! There were refreshments and elaborate meals served by servants in mask and costume. Guests also delighted at the sight of exotic animals in the royal menagerie such as an elephant, a camel, and a bear. French actor and playwright Molière and Italian composer and violinist Lully organized the entertainment. Louis XIV himself danced the part of Ruggiero in a ballet, The Princess of Elide, that had been written for this particular occasion by the two artists. The Round Pool (which later became Apollo’s Fountain) was used to stage a recreation of Alcina’s palace. At the conclusion of the performance, Alcina and her servants departed her castle while riding on the backs of a whale and two whale calves.

The illustrations below depict scenes from the party. Note the elephant and camel in the first one, the ballet performance in the second (Louis XIV, who had a starring role, was quite proud of his dancing ability⁷), and the castle of Alcina in the third. If I had the ability to time travel and my choice of where I could visit, this party is definitely a top-five destination.

The celebration was officially dedicated to the two Queens of France: Louis XIV’s mother, Anne of Austria, and his wife, Maria-Theresa of Spain. However, the party’s unofficial honoree was Françoise-Louise de la Baume Le Blanc, Duchess de la Vallière, the first official mistress⁸ of Louis XIV. In fact, Louise had been living at Versailles since her affair with the King began in 1661. Their relationship was an open secret at the time of the party and a popular topic of gossip.

On July 16, 1668, a second giant party was held at Versailles with 1,500 guests in attendance. The Grand Royal Entertainment was held to celebrate the military successes of France during the War of Devolution with Spain⁹ and the signing of the Peace Treaty of Aix-Chapelle. Louis XIV also had a new mistress, Françoise-Athénaïse de Rochechouart de Mortemart, Marquise de Montespan, to whom the celebrations were dedicated.

The party lasted for one night and took place in the gardens. The celebration began in the late afternoon with a visit to the Dragon Fountain, which makes for an impressive sight as its main water jet shoots water up to a height of 27 metres (88.5 feet), making it the tallest and most powerful water feature at Versailles.

Guests were then invited to partake in a lavish afternoon tea in the Star Grove. Following that, members of the court were then delivered via coach and sedan chair to the site of what would be the highlight of the festivities: a comedic ballet performance of George Dandin, which featured the music of Molière and Lully as well as the choreography of ballet master Pierre Beauchamp. The ballet required more than a hundred dancers, and the elaborate set decoration included blue tapestries decorated with fleur-de-lis and 32 crystal chandeliers. The performance was followed up with a feast and a ball.

At the conclusion of the festivities, the guests were taken to the bottom of the Grand Perspective. There, they enjoyed a view across the gardens looking back towards the Château. The residence was lit up from inside, and there were rows of illuminated statues and painted vases lined up along the Great Lawn. Just when the guests thought it couldn’t get any better, fireworks burst across the sky. It must have felt like a fairy tale ending to an already magical evening.

On the day after The Grand Royal Entertainment, Louis XIV concluded that the existing château built by his father was too small. Rather than demolishing the old residence and building anew, Louis XIV had Le Vau construct a new white stone building that enveloped the older residence on its north, west, and south sides (shown in the 3-D model below). This building is known as the enveloppe or the château neuf to distinguish it from Louis XIII’s original structure. The château neuf resembled a baroque Roman villa, the popular architectural style at the time of its construction. It contrasted sharply with the red brick, stone, and slate of Louis XIII’s original residence so much that it looked like there were two châteaux, one slotted into the other. Construction took place from 1668-1674; after Le Vau passed away in 1670, architect François d’Orbay continued with the project. Le Brun guided the interior decoration of the new residence. The château neuf consisted of three separate wings, each with three floors: the ground floor, the main floor, and the upper floor¹⁰. The main floor of the north and south wings consisted of two symmetrical suites of apartments: one for the King on the northern end (the Grand appartement du roi), and one for the Queen on the south (Grand appartement de la reine). The west wing, the one that overlooked the gardens, contained some of these apartments on its northern and southern ends. The King’s and Queen’s apartments were then separated by a large, marble terrace that lay in the middle of the west wing.

Below is a floor plan of the main floor of the expanded Château de Versailles. Louis XIII’s original château is shaded grey. The new château neuf, which enclosed the older structure, is outlined in green. The King’s new suite of apartments is shown on the right (the north) in blue, and the Queen’s on the left (south) in yellow. The terrasse can be seen separating them in the middle of the west wing. This symmetrical design of apartments was an unprecedented feature in French palace design. It’s suggested that Louis XIV had this identical set of rooms built for his wife, Maria-Theresa, because he intended to establish her as Queen of Spain. They would rule as dual monarchs: equal in power, status, and State Apartments. (See footnote 9 for more information on why Louis XIV felt Maria-Theresa had a claim to the Spanish throne).

The expanded western/garden-side façade of the château can be seen in the painting below. The King’s State Apartments were located on the left, and the Queen’s on the right. You can see the large open-air terrace in-between them, located on the main floor.

Below is a model that shows the western/garden side façade from above, with a view of the terrace (which contained a fountain in the middle). You can see how the new white stone building of the château neuf was built around the red-brick residence of Louis XIII. The two small inner courtyards help to mark out the different structures.

The King and the Queen already had apartments located in the original residence that had been built by Louis XIII. They retained these rooms even as Versailles expanded, but they were meant for their own private use (you can learn more about and tour the King’s Private Apartments in this post). The new State Apartments built on the main floor in the château neuf were public spaces and served a performative function (you can learn more about and tour the King’s State Apartments in this post). Each apartment suite consisted of seven adjoining rooms: a vestibule; a guard room; an antechamber; a chamber; a large cabinet or office; a bedroom; and then a smaller cabinet. Three of the rooms were located in the western wing overlooking the gardens, and then four more found in their respective north and south wings (you can see this in the floor plan, shown previously). The apartments on the main floor connected to the ground floor through a ceremonial stairway.

The State Apartments were richly decorated, and their ceilings had paintings with allegorical or mythological themes. To complement Louis XIV’s identification with the Sun God Apollo, each room was dedicated to a planet and its associated Greco-Roman deity (Venus, Mars, Mercury, etc.). Further decoration of the rooms included references to historical figures from antiquity, such as Alexander the Great and the Roman Emperor Augustus; Louis XIV’s association with them was meant to highlight his similar heroic qualities. The walls were covered with polychrome marble, and large bay windows filled the rooms with natural light.

Construction on the château neuf was carried out between 1668-1674. At the same time, Le Nȏtre was busy with further improvements to the grounds of Versailles. He was tasked with making them the most magnificent of their kind in Europe. He embellished the grounds with fountains, statues, flower beds, a labyrinth, and groves of trees. From 1668-1679, Le Nȏtre had the Grand Canal built. With a length of 1,670 metres (5,479 feet, just over a mile) and a width of 62 metres (203 feet), the canal was large enough for all kinds of boats including galleys, gondolas, yachts, barges, and replicas of French battleships. In this period, the grounds of Versailles reached a peak area of 2,473 hectares (6,111 acres)¹¹.

In the summer of 1674, Louis XIV decided it was time for another big party. The Franco-Dutch War had kicked off in 1672, and Louis XIV wanted to celebrate recent French military successes including the reconquering of the Franche-Comté (a territory that he had been bitterly forced to give up in 1668). The King also wanted to show off the impressive modifications that had been made to the grounds at Versailles, and so most of the festivities were held outside. The Grand Fête was a festival of six parties that took place between July 4 and August 31. Madame de Montspan was once more the festival honouree. The first celebration day was held on July 4 and featured an opera by Lully, Alceste, staged in the Marble Courtyard. Dinner was served in the Grove of the Marais.

On July 11 (the second celebration day), the Porcelain Trianon hosted a ballet performance by Lully, L’Eclogue de Versailles (for more on the Porcelain Trianon, read this post on the history of the Grand Trianon). A dinner illuminated by 150 candles was held in the Grove of the Feast Hall. On July 19 (the third celebration day), the Thetys Grotto served as a backdrop to a comedic ballet, Du Malaide Imaginaire, by Molière and composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier. A meal was supplied in the Menagerie. Guests also took turns boating on the Grand Canal in two gondolas that had been gifted to Louis XIV by the Republic of Venice. The gondolas and the four gondoliers sent to man them were housed in a series of buildings at the end of the Canal, which became known as “Little Venice.”

On July 28 (the fourth celebration day), a lyrical pastoral performance of La Fête de l’Amour et du Bacchus was staged at the Dragon Fountain. The audience was treated to a rich selection of fruit, ice, wine, liqueurs and jams. A light snack was served in the Grove of the Water Theatre, and then guests were serenaded by violins and oboes while enjoying their dinner in the Marble Courtyard. A fireworks display also lit up the Grand Canal.

On August 18 (the fifth celebration day), the tragedy Iphigéne by Jean Racine was performed in front of the Orangery. Food was available in the Grove of the Girandole. Later that night, guests crowded around the newly finished Apollo Fountain to watch a fireworks show that consisted of at least 5,000 rockets. The fireworks lit up an obelisk created by Le Brun, which was topped by the figure of a sun—Louis XIV’s personal emblem (seen in the picture below).

On the sixth and final evening, August 28, the Grand Canal was the centre of the entertainment. Courtiers once more took turns riding in the gondolas, accompanied by boats of musicians. The entire canal was also illuminated, as seen in the picture below.

Louis XIV was increasingly spending more time at the Château de Versailles and, with him, so too was the French Court. In 1677, he decided that he wanted to move the court and government there permanently. This was a revolutionary idea, as European kings and their courts had always lived life on the move, dividing their time and presence between different residences and regions in their territory. Versailles would have to be significantly enlarged^12,13 in order to permanently house all the members of the royal family, the members of the court and their retinues, as well as all their servants. Louis XIV hired architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart to conduct this third round of building expansion at Versailles, which he began in 1678. Mansart’s additions increased the capacity of the Château five-fold, and made it possible to accommodate a further 4,000 people. He built two new stables (1679-1682) that were located at the foot of the Place d’Armes: the Petites Écuries in the south was for the cart horses, and the Grandes Écuries in the north for the saddle horses (used for riding and hunting). Two new wings containing living quarters were built to the south (1679-1682) and north (1685-1689) of the residence. Two new Ministers’ Wings (1679-1682) containing offices for the four Secretaries of State (Foreign Affairs, War, King’s Household, and Navy) were built on the north and south sides of the Cour d’Honneur. The Grand Commun¹⁴ (completed in 1684) was built in the south to house service rooms (such as kitchens and pantries), servants, and secondary officers. I’ve indicated the location of the new structures on the map below.

In 1678, Mansart demolished the outdoor terrace that had been located in the middle of the western wing of the residence and replaced it with what would become the Château’s most famous feature: the Galerie des Glaces, the Hall of Mirrors, which was completed in 1684.  

At the time, mirrors were among the most expensive items that one could possess. The Republic of Venice had a monopoly on their manufacture. Louis XIV’s finance minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, had a requirement that all items used in the decoration of Versailles be made in France. He convinced a few Venetian glassmakers to come to France to design the mirrors for Versailles¹⁵. The Hall of Mirrors is 73 metres (239.5 feet) long by 10.5 meters (34.4 feet) wide by 12.3 meters (40.4 feet) high. It is flanked by the Salon de la Guerre (War Room) on the north side and the Salon de la Paix (Room of Peace) on the south. Three rooms from the Queen’s suite of State Apartments and three rooms from the King’s suite of State Apartments (the ones that had been located in the west wing), were absorbed into the new design, which you can see in the map below.

The Hall of Mirrors contains 17 mirror-clad arches that reflect 17 arcaded windows. Each arch contains 21 mirrors, for a total of 357. Marble pilasters topped with gilded bronze capitals are located on either side of the arches; the capitals are decorated with fleur-de-lys and roosters (France’s national animal). The room was originally illuminated by thousands of candles, and contained silver furniture (later melted down to fund Louis XIV’s army during the War of the League of Augsburg from 1688-1697).

The ceiling contains 30 paintings by Le Brun that portray the military and diplomatic victories of Louis XIV achieved from 1661-1678. A painting in the central panel, Le Roi Gouverne par Lui-même (the King Governs Alone), encapsulates Louis XIV’s attitude towards leadership and the distribution of power. The room was designed to impress, and during weddings and diplomatic events Louis XIV’s throne would be placed on a platform at the south end of the room in front of the Salon de la Paix.

On May 6, 1682, Versailles was declared the official residence of Louis XIV, his court, and the government of France. There had always been royal courts, but the way Louis XIV structured court life and power at Versailles was truly innovative for several reasons. The first was that he had the court and government permanently housed and centralized at the Château de Versailles. Louis XIV exercised his power by making his people come to him, rather than going to them by moving his court between different regional bases as had been the tradition of royal households for centuries. To make this work, he mandated that his nobles spend time every year at Versailles and was strict about their consequent attendance. He took note of which courtiers were present and absent, and treated them accordingly. He saw everyone, especially those who were hoping to escape his attention. His subjects felt compelled to be at Versailles as much as possible, with the threat of royal disfavour hanging over them if they weren’t. “He is a man I never see,” the King once commented of a courtier, the chill in his words akin to a harsh judicial blow. 

Housing the government and royal court in its entirety at Versailles allowed for the second of Louis XIV’s innovations, which was his ability to centralize power to a degree that no monarch had ever enjoyed before. All favours of land, titles, offices, pensions, and more were granted through him. Honour and income were all dependant on him. Louis XIV’s royal approval had the ability to make or break not only an individual, but also their family for generations to come. He was truly the “Sun King”, the centre of power around which all of France revolved. This was a lot of responsibility, and the King needed a system in which he could effectively manage all of that expectant energy. And so he made Versailles a stage upon which he was the focus as well as the master of spectacle. Every moment of Louis XIV’s day became a performance and an act of state, and he made his courtiers desperate to play a part in it. Elaborate ceremonies were made of his most private moments: hundreds of courtiers and members of the general public watched him eat his evening meal (the Grand Couvert), and his bedroom was filled every morning and evening with nobles who helped him perform the rituals of “getting up” (lever) and “going to bed” (coucher). The lever and coucher ceremonies were so involved that they were divided into two: the Petit Lever/Coucher and the Grand Lever/Coucher. Nobles were admitted into the King’s Bedchamber and the ceremonies were based on rank. For example, with the lever, the first to enter the King’s Bedchamber were those with the right to see Louis XIV still in his bed (the Petit Lever). Then those with the right to see the King in his dressing gown, seated in a chair, would be given admittance. Finally, the entire court would enter as he was being dressed (the Grand Lever). By the end of the ceremony, almost 150 people would be in the room. This same sequence of events took place in the evening but in reverse, with the crowd eventually dwindling to those privileged few who had the right to see the King in bed once more. 

The degree to which rank and rituals of etiquette were connected was the third of Louis XIV’s innovations with Versailles. Strict rules of court etiquette served to establish and maintain a hierarchy that held Louis XIV at the top. Everyone else became obsessed with where exactly they were slotted in beneath him. Prestige, rank, and appearance were crucial. Extravagance was compulsory; trying to keep up with the expensive court lifestyle led to nobles depending on handouts from the King and/or the state treasury. Political tension and satisfaction fixated on who had the honour of sitting on a chair in the King’s presence and who was required to stand. At the Grand Couvert, only twelve titled ladies had the right to be seated on stools before the royal table while hundreds of other courtiers had to stand and watch as the King ate his evening meal. Further, your rank determined whether your chair had a backrest or armrests, effectively setting up how comfortable you would be while basking in the glory of the King’s presence. But there was always hope for advancement! Maybe today would be the day in which one would have the privilege of holding the King’s mirror or wash basin as he shaved! The man who held the candlestick that illuminated the King as he undressed held one of the highest positions of all. Louis XIV reasoned that if he kept all of the powerful people in his country at Versailles and focused all of their attention on him, making them compete with each other for his favour, then they would be too busy to scheme against him. According to French political theorist Henri de Saint-Simon, Louis XIV’s granting of distinction was proof that “the king possessed before all men the art of giving importance to trifles.” It may seem crazy to contemporary audiences, but it seems to have been effective: Louis XIV reigned for an impressive 72 years. At the beginning of his rule, Louis XIV’s kingdom had almost been torn apart by violent civil war. The centralization of power at Versailles with mandatory courtier attendance combined with the fixation of rank through exercises of etiquette seems to have managed to tame the dissident impulses of his people, as well as preventing the regional concentrations of power that could have effectively challenged his own. There may be some truth to the adage of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer.  

A fourth innovation of court life at Versailles was how visible and accessible the monarch made himself to the people, courtiers and commoners alike. I’ve already mentioned how Louis XIV transformed many aspects of his personal life into public ritual. In addition to this, Louis XIV opened most of the Château and its gardens to the general public. Any well-dressed individual could walk past the Écuries and through the first entry gate of the Château into the Place d’Armes. Beggars, monks, sex workers, and smallpox victims were the only people specifically turned away at this point. Visitors would then approach the Gate of Honour. If the individual was wearing a sword, indicating their upper-class status, the person was permitted to continue. No sword? No problem! You were allowed to hire one on the spot. The now-armed visitor was duly granted access to the residence and its grounds. Consider the irony the next time you’re standing in the long security line to enter the Château. Rules of etiquette did bar commoners from entry into certain rooms when the King was in them, but they would be allowed in the moment after the monarch had stepped out. An English writer, Arthur Young, was shocked to see this exact thing happen in Louis XVI’s Bedchamber when he visited Versailles in 1787¹⁶. People gathered in the Hall of Mirrors on a daily basis in order to catch a glimpse of the King as he made his way from the State Apartments to the Royal Chapel. There were also opportunities to see the King exercising in the gardens, or watching him eat at the Grand Couvert. Louis XIV took his public accessibility seriously. When his daughter-in-law, Dauphine Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria (1660-1690), asked to be excused from a ball because she felt unwell, he refused, saying: “We are not like private individuals. We owe ourselves entirely to the public.” Louis XIV’s predecessors would increasingly retreat from living such a public life, and their popularity suffered as a result.

A fifth and final innovation of court life at Versailles was that Louis XIV made it fun. I’ve already mentioned the grand entertainments and firework displays. In addition, there were thrice-a-week parties in the State Apartments with dancing, music, gambling, and tables heaped with food, wine, and desserts (for more information on these soirées d’appartement, see my second post about touring the Château de Versailles which includes the State Apartments). Louis XIV was a great patron of the arts, and courtiers were kept entertained by numerous plays, operas, concerts, and ballets—some in which the King himself performed! The court life at Versailles was so exciting and rich with social and cultural opportunities that one could almost forget that being there was more a requirement than a choice. 

On any given day 3,000-10,000 courtiers could be present at Versailles, with 6,000-7,000 being the average. Slightly more than half of Louis XIV’s court lived outside the Château. Around 3,000 of them either lived in or stayed nearby with acquaintances in the new town of Versailles, which had been relocated and specially built by Louis XIV from 1671 onwards (see footnote 12a for more information). Another number of courtiers known as les galopins (the gallopers) made the daily trip from Paris to be at the Versailles court. Around 4,000 members of this daily assembly of courtiers had lodgings in the Château itself or one of its dependencies. Living at the Château had benefits that came hand-in-hand with drawbacks. On the one hand, lodging was free as it was provided to courtiers at the state’s expense. On the other hand, it had a high moral cost: Louis XIV believed that the courtiers who resided at Versailles owed everything of value in their lives to him as their monarch. On the plus side, there was a certain prestige attached to those who lived at the Château in a world where rank and esteem were very important. On the down side, the honour of residing at Versailles was in sharp contrast to the actual lived experience of those who stayed there. Even with the recent renovations and expansions, space at the Château was still at a premium. Courtiers who weren’t royal or titled enough to be considered deserving of anything but the most basic accommodation were only given two rooms, which was not a lot of space for someone to house their whole family and any servants they had in their employ. The rooms lacked a hearth or any basic kitchen facilities, which was a problem because the windows were drafty and meals were not supplied by the King. Courtiers had to figure out how to feed themselves at their own expense, usually through the hiring of outside catering. The rooms could also be smelly thanks to the latrines found further down the hallway or in the staircases. Overall, the living conditions at Versailles paled in comparison to what a courtier would be used to in their own home. A person would actually live more comfortably if they were able to maintain their own separate lodgings either in the town of Versailles or Paris, where they could keep all their servants and their carriage. But this was definitely more inconvenient, especially since ladies were required to change their outfit three or four times a day.

After Maria-Theresa’s death in 1683, Louis XIV had modifications done to the Private Apartments. He had some of the rooms from the Queen’s Private Apartments reallocated into a third set of apartments for him, the Petit appartements du roi (Small Apartments of the King). Unlike the King’s State Apartments and the King’s Private Apartments, which were largely open to courtiers and members of the general public alike, access to the King’s Small Apartments was provided only through personal invitation. In the illustration below, the King’s State Apartments are shown on the far right, in dark purple. The King’s Private Apartments are shown to the right of the Marble Courtyard in light purple. The new King’s Small Apartments are shown to the left and above the Marble Courtyard in medium purple. The Queen’s State Apartments are shown to the far left in yellow. The Queen’s Private Apartments were reduced to the ones that are shown in dark pink. No further need to have symmetrical his-and-her apartments, I guess, now that his preferred candidate for Queen of Spain was gone.

In 1683, Louis XIV also married his third official mistress, Françoise d’Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon, in secret. Françoise came from an impoverished background¹⁷. Her inferior social position meant that she was not openly acknowledged as Louis XIV’s wife nor did she become Queen. Nonetheless, she did have a powerful influence on the King and was one of his closest advisors.

In 1699, Louis XIV had Mansart begin work on a new Royal Chapel. It was the fifth, and final, chapel built at Versailles since the reign of Louis XIII. It would also be the last grand project that both Louis XIV and Mansart undertook at the Château. Upon Mansart’s death in 1708, work on the chapel was completed by his assistant (and brother-in-law) Robert de Cotte in 1710. The design for the chapel incorporates gothic architecture and baroque decoration, and has a two-floor layout that is similar to the Palatine Chapel in Aachen, Germany (which was built for Charlemagne around 792 C.E.). The chapel was dedicated to Saint Louis IX (1214-1290), patron saint and ancestor of Louis XIV.

In 1701, Louis XIV had his Ceremonial Bedchamber moved from its location in the State Apartments to a more central position in the residence. He had it placed on the main (second) floor, overlooking the Marble Courtyard, and backing against the Hall of Mirrors.

Louis XIV passed away on September 1, 1715. His reign of 72 years was so long that he survived his son Louis, the Grand Dauphin (who died in 1711 at the age of 49), and his grandson, Louis the Petit Dauphin (who passed away in 1712 at the age of 29). He was succeeded by his great-grandson, Louis XV. Louis XIV is the figure who played the most prominent role in the creation of Versailles, and so it seems fitting to end part 1 of the Château’s history at this point. I’ll continue part 2 in my next blog post, covering the history of the Château under Louis XV and Louis XVI (until 1783). Thanks for reading!  

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¹ Numerous palaces throughout Europe have been inspired by the magic and grandeur of Versailles: the Peterhof Palace in St. Petersburg, Russia (constructed 1714-1723, nicknamed “the Russian Versailles”); the Palacio Real de Madrid in Spain (constructed 1738-1755); the Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna, Austria (built in the 1740s-1750s); Karlsruhe Schloss (first built in 1715, rebuilt entirely of stone in 1746); the Reggia di Caserta in southern Italy (1752- around 1773); and King Ludwig II of Bavaria’s Schloss Herrenchiemsee (1878-1886).  

² This distinction between a rural and urban grand estate is not made in the English language the way it is in French, so in English it is most often referred to as the Palace of Versailles. For more information on the difference between châteaux, palaces, and castles, see my post on the Loire Valley.

³ The website for the Château de Versailles contains a page with a video that shows the changes made to the structure over time. Click here to see Versailles from the time it was first built in 1624 as a hunting lodge by Louis XIII through its major construction periods under Louis XIV, up until the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1792.

⁴ Maria-Theresa is also the subject of Diego Velázquez’s famous painting, Las Meninas (The Maids of Honour), 1656. The figure of a young Maria-Theresa in this painting (shown below) with her wide hooped dress inspired an art installation that appeared on the streets of Madrid, which Neil and I got to see when we were there! These Las Meninas (from the Meninas Madrid Gallery) are a series of 80 identical sculptures of a female figure with a wide hooped dress and a cropped hairstyle. (I would argue that the hairstyle comes from Velázquez’s painting of Maria-Theresa when she was fifteen, which I already used in the post above). Sculptor Antonio Azzato designed the Meninas and recruited a group of artists, fashion designers, and singers to help decorate them. The Meninas were auctioned off for charity in July 2018.

⁵ Louis Le Vau and Charles Le Brun also worked together on the renovations of the Louvre and the Tuileries Palaces, which began in 1659. See my post on the Louvre for more information about that project.

⁶ Orlando Furioso was written by Italian poet Ludivico Ariosto (known as “Ariosto”) from 1505-1532. In one of the episodes of the poem, the knight Ruggiero arrives on an enchanted island that belongs to the magician Alcina and her sister Morgana. Alcina falls in love with Ruggiero and casts a spell on him to keep him on the island. Later, Ruggiero’s fianceé, Bradamante, comes to the island disguised as a man (Ruggiero’s brother, Ricciardo) in search of him. Morgana then falls in love with “Ricciardo” and many spectacular magical antics ensue.

⁷ Below is an image of Louis XIV dressed as Apollo, a role he played in 1653 in The Ballet of Night by Giacomo Torelli, based on verses by Isaac de Benserade. The ballet called for over 100 costumes, designed by Henri Gissey. Louis XIV played the role of the rising sun dressed in golden feathers. He would reprise his role as Apollo in several court ballets.

⁸ Louise was the first maîtresse-en-titre (chief mistress) of Louis XIV. This was an official position that came with its own apartments. The title came into use during the reign of Louis XIII’s father, Henri IV. Louis XIV had three official mistresses who would hold that title: Françoise-Louise de la Baume Le Blanc, Duchess de la Vallière (1661-1667); Françoise-Athénaïse de Rochechouart de Mortemart, Marquise de Montespan (1667-1681); and Françoise d’Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon (1680-1715). Of course, a chief mistress does not mean the only mistress. Louis XIV had relations with at least two dozen other women. I would almost think it’s weird that their names all began with “Françoise” but there’s a lot of women with “Marie-othername”and “Maria-othername” coming our way soon; Maria-Theresa was just the warm-up.

⁹ In 1659, France and Spain ended 24 years of war with the Treaty of Pyrenees. Philip IV of Spain agreed to marry his daughter, Maria-Theresa, to Louis XIV on the condition that the marriage voided her inheritance rights to her father’s Spanish throne. To compensate her for this, a dowry of 500,000 gold crowns was promised, but never actually paid, to Louis XIV. When Philip IV of Spain passed away in September 1665, Louis XIV claimed that since Maria-Theresa’s dowry had not actually been paid, his wife’s renunciation of her inheritance rights was invalid. Maria-Theresa was born out of Philip IV’s first marriage, whereas the underage Spanish heir Charles II (four years old at the time) was the result of Philip IV’s second marriage. Thus, Louis XIV argued, the estate of Philip IV properly “devolved” to Maria-Theresa. This led to the War of Devolution, which broke out on May 24, 1667. Louis XIV and his armies quickly conquered the Hapsburg-controlled Spanish Netherlands (present-day Belgium) and other surrounding territories. Louis XIV wanted to conquer as many Spanish territories as possible. He planned to use them as bargaining chips for peace negotiations. The Spanich Franche-Comté, a region in eastern France, was one of them. He tasked Louis II de Bourbon, the Prince de Condé (known as the Grand Condé), with the military action. Condé invaded on February 4, 1668 and, a short 17 days later, all of the Franche-Comté was successfully occupied. However, Louis XIV’s plans were halted when he was informed that an alliance had been formed against him by Spain, the Netherlands, England, and Sweden. He knew that France was no match for this coalition. The Peace Treaty of Aix-Chapelle was signed on May 2, 1668. Louis XIV was allowed to keep some of his conquered Flemish territory, but he had to give up most of his conquered territories in the Spanish Netherlands and the Franche-Comté. He was angered by this result. In particular, he felt that he had been betrayed by the Dutch, as France had provided assistance to the Dutch during their war of independence from Spain (the Eighty Years’ War of 1568-1654). Tensions would lead later to the Franco-Dutch War of 1672-1678. ANYWAY. The Grand Entertainment of July 1668 was meant to paint a bright, victorious face on what could have been otherwise considered a military and political disappointment. Charles II (Maria-Theresa’s younger half-brother) ruled Spain until he died, childless, on November 1, 1700. Charles II named Philip of Anjou as his successor. Philip of Anjou was the grandson of Louis XIV and Maria-Theresa. Philip’s father, Louis the Grand Dauphin (son of Louis XIV), could not claim the Spanish throne since he was in the line of succession for the French one. So too was Philip’s elder brother, Louis the Petit Dauphin. So the second son is up! Of course, other European countries were not a fan of having the Spanish throne in the hands of the French as that would have meant a major power imbalance. So this kicked off the War of the Spanish Succession (1700-1714). Philip V of Spain ruled from 1700-1724, and then again from 1724-1746 (with a brief seven month interruption in which his son, Louis I, ruled until he died of smallpox).   

¹⁰ in Europe, the numbering of floors is done in a different sequence than in North America, so it can be a little confusing. In North America, the ground floor is called the “first” floor. In Europe, the ground floor is equal to floor “0.” In North America, the next floor up would be called the “second” floor. In Europe, this would be called the “first” floor. The three wings of the chateau neuf contained three separate floors. Instead of calling them (in accordance with North American custom) the “first”, “second”, and “third” floors, I’m referring to them respectively as the “ground floor”, the “main floor”, and the “upper floor.”

¹¹ Under Louis XIV, the grounds of Versailles reached a peak area of 2,473 hectares (6,111 acres). Compare that with the 2.5 acres that Louis XIII started out with for his hunting lodge!. The grounds of Versailles are now only 815 hectares (2,014 acres)—roughly ⅓ the size they were during the time of Louis XIV.

¹² It was at this point in his plans to expand the Château de Versailles and its grounds that Louis XIV found he had run out of room. Do you remember that earlier painting of the Château dating to 1667-1668? (Included below, once more). You can see the old medieval village of Versailles in the left corner (note the church steeple of the parish church of Saint-Julien; that is where the Grand Commun is now located). But Louis XIV was not the kind of man who would let something simple like a pre-existing town deter him. Louis XIV had Hardouin-Mansart and Le Nôtre design a new town that would be located on a new site farther away from the Château. He would then have the old town demolished to make way for his new building projects. In 1671, a royal charter offered up plots of land in this new area with the condition that the houses built there had to use pre-approved building materials and conform to a pre-determined size and style that would complement the Château. A micro-manager to the extreme, Louis XIV even regulated the colour and exterior decoration of these houses. Many of these new houses were destined to become Hôtels Particuliers for the incoming nobility. In 1673, Louis XIV had the old buildings of Versailles razed to the ground. Le Nôtre then laid out three wide, large tree-lined avenues that extended from the Château eastward into the town like sunbeams (a purposeful symbolic detail): the Avenue de Saint-Cloud, the Avenue de Paris, and the Avenue de Sceux (seals). These streets were similar to the wide pedestrian boulevards that Louis XIV was having built in Paris in place of its old (now demolished) city walls. The streets and squares found in the rest of the new town of Versailles were laid out in an orderly, rectilinear grid. A new neighbourhood was created on the northern flank of the Château to house the 20,000 construction workers and artisans of every description who came to make Louis XIV’s plans a reality. By the latter years of Louis XIV’s reign, the urban population of Versailles numbered 45,000 people.

The old town of Versailles can be seen in the lower-left side of the painting below.

The new relocated and rebuilt town of Versailles can be see in the foreground of the painting below (the Château de Versailles is in the background).

¹³ In 1668, Louis XIV purchased the hamlet of Trianon, which was situated within the estate of Versailles. He also razed the buildings of this little town to the ground and rehoused the inhabitants. He then directed Le Vau to build him a one-storey summer house (which you can read more about here). The Grand Trianon and the Petit Trianon are named after this lost village. In Patel’s painting above, you can maybe see the hamlet if you look really close; it was located northwest of the main residence.

¹⁴ From 1832-1986, the Grand Commun was used as a military hospital, later called the Dominique Larrey hospital. Then it lay empty and abandoned for a decade. Remarkably, much of its window glass remained unchanged from when Louis XIV had built it three hundred years earlier! In 1996, the army handed ownership of the Grand Commun to the National Estate of Versailles. A huge alteration and restoration project began. In 2006 and 2007, archaeological digs were carried out in the courtyard of the Grand Commun. That Merovingian cemetery I mentioned at the beginning of this post? It was found here; so too were traces of Louis XIII’s tennis court.

¹⁵ Legend has it that assassins were sent to poison these glassworkers to punish them for revealing the secrets of their trade. An interesting story, but it sounds apocryphal. I’d have to do a bit more digging to find out if that was true.

¹⁶ In his 1792 travel book, Travels in France, Arthur Young commented: “In viewing the King’s apartment, which he had not left a quarter of an hour [before], with those slight traits of disorder that showed he lived in it, it was amusing to see the blackguard figures that were walking uncontrolled about the palace, and even in [the king’s] bedchamber; men whose rags betrayed them to be in the last stage of poverty, and I was the only person that stared and wondered how the devil they got there.”

¹⁷ Here are a few more details concerning the background of Françoise d’Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon, because they are interesting. Her father, Constant d’Aubigné, was imprisoned from 1629-1639 for conspiring against Cardinal Richelieu (Louis XIII’s Chief Minister). Françoise was born during this time period in 1635; her mother was Jeanne de Cardilhac, daughter of Constant’s jailer. When Constant was released in 1639, the family moved to the island of Martinique in the west Indies. Constant died destitute in 1647, and Françoise was sent to live with her aunt. She was then educated in a convent. Madame de Neuillant, the mother of Françoise’s godmother Suzanne de Baudéan, introduced Françoise to higher society. Françoise married French poet and novelist Paul Scarron in 1652 (he was 25 years her senior), but was widowed in 1660. Through her connections she met Madame de Montespan in 1666, Louis XIV’s current lover. In 1669, when Madame de Montespan’s second child by Louis XIV was born, Françoise was hired on as a governess. This led to her meeting Louis XIV, who was initially put off by her strict religious disposition. His feelings had softened by 1675, when he gave her a title—the Marquise de Maintenon. It is unknown when Louis XIV and Françoise began having an intimate relationship, but by the late 1670s he was spending a lot of his spare time with her. In 1680, Louis XIV gave her a prominent position in his daughter-in-law’s household (the Dauphine Maria Anna of Bavaria, who was married to Louis, the Grand Dauphin). Soon after, Madame de Montespan left court. Françoise, Madame de Maintenon, had a strong (some would argue good) influence on Louis XIV. She was also kind to Maria-Theresa who, for years, had been rudely treated by Madame de Montespan.