Today is Thursday.
Arriving at the hotel at midnight we were up at 7:00 AM for another
adventure in Paris. After having
breakfast we met our guide and started our journey out to Versailles. We found that we would be with another
couple. Surprised to find they were from
St. Louis, so we hit it off right away.
They were also cheering for the Royals.
The guide passed on
information all the way out. Too much to
relate here. Arriving at Versailles we
did a short tour of the city and then entered the grounds of the castle. I will say up front that the Kings knew how
to live.
King Louie XIII was a warrior and a man with a strong
personality. He was able to control the
various factions in what is now France and bring them under the rule of one
King. He was a visionary, who saw the
need for a unified land and a castle to impress those he wanted to rule. He used Versailles to impress his
subjects. He started with his father’s
hunting lodge and expanded it into the site we have today. He expanded the hunting lodge into a
magnificent castle. The construction of
the Chateau began in about 1682 and by 1683 there were over 30,000 workers
employed. The greatest obstacle to
overcome was the supply of water for the fountains. There were two, two story stables constructed. One for the King and one for the Queen. A separate kitchen building was built because
of the chance of fire. He built a large
formal garden down the hill from the castle.
The surrounding land was lowered, so the Castle would be higher than the
homes of the common folks. He put in
fountains and formal landscaping. The
fountains worked by releasing the water from the castle and as it sought it
level it caused the fountains to flow.
No artificial pumps were used.
Inside the castle the Hall of Mirrors was probably the most
impressive room, to us. In the King’s
bedroom he had three mattresses on his bed, so he could be higher than the
queens bed. They had separate bedrooms
and only privileged persons could visit them there.
King Louie the XIII did everything as a ceremony. Getting up in the morning was a ceremony,
getting dressed, leaving the bedroom, eating breakfast. He did this to establish himself as the most
important person in the world and to impress everyone who visited him. To observe these ceremonies was by invitation
only and was considered a high honor.
When he was dying, from gangrene, he turned this into a ceremony.
Marriages were for political reasons and were often by
proxy.... Probably explain the reason Kings kept mistresses. The role of the Queen was to bear children,
mainly boys. Since most children died at
an early age it kept the Queen busy. It
was not unusual to have 10 to 12 kids, in the hope one would survive to carry
on the Royal family.
It is said that King Louie the XIII built the kingdom, King
Louie the XIV enjoyed the role and King Louie the XV paid for it, as he and
Marie Antoinette lost their heads.
The Chateau deteriorated after the French revolution. Napoleon hated Versailles and refused to live
there. It fell into ruins and took ten
years to auction off all the furniture.
At this time there was talk of tearing the Chateau down.
After WW I, the contribution of a wealthy American helped
rescue Versailles and allowed it to be the showcase museum it is today.
After spending the morning at Versailles we returned to Paris
for lunch and visit the Louvre.
The Louvre is a magnificent museum. We spent a little over 3 hours there and
barely started to take in all that it has to offer.
We started our tour by visiting the lower area, where we saw
some of the original construction of the castle. Workmen from all over Europe worked on
building it. You could see the different
styles of stonework they used and the signatures left by the stonemasons.
Our first stop after leaving the lower area was visiting the
pink Sphinx. It was carved out of pink
granite, which we were told is very difficult.
From here we moved to the Winged Victory statue. It was discovered broken in over 200 pieces
and was restored and moved to the museum.
The marble statues of Italy was our next stop. Here the guide discussed the transformation
of the statues, from still with no face expressions to showing movement and
facial expression. The women’s body was
considered ugly and was always covered, while the male was almost always
sculptured naked. The first statue of a
woman with bare breasts actually had a lower body of a male but still covered.
The tour through the area containing paintings of the
masters was very interesting. We saw the
Mona Lisa, and found out that it is painted on wood not canvas, and that the
wood is rotting from the back. Experts
from around the world are working on a technique to save this famous painting.
The day was long, but not long enough as there was so much
to see and enjoy. The knowledge of the
guide was quite impressive and I wish we could have retained all that she told
us.
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| Red Granite Sphinx |
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| Winged Victory |
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| Mona Lisa |
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| Roman Statues |
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