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110-639: Mobutu built Gbadolite into a luxurious town often nicknamed " Versailles of the Jungle". He built a hydroelectric dam on the nearby Ubangi River in Mobayi Mbongo , an international airport, Gbadolite Airport , which could accommodate a Concorde , and three large palaces . As a result, the people of the town had no trouble finding jobs. During Mobutu's regime , Gbadolite also had companies such as CDIA Zaire for farming productions, SOZAGEC for road construction, and SAFRICAS for house construction. The town had

220-571: A World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1979 for its importance as the centre of power, art, and science in France during the 17th and 18th centuries. The French Ministry of Culture has placed the palace, its gardens, and some of its subsidiary structures on its list of culturally significant monuments . In 1623, Louis XIII , king of France , built a hunting lodge on a hill in a favourite hunting ground, 19 kilometres (12 mi) west of Paris , and 16 kilometres (10 mi) from his primary residence,

330-644: A ballroom in the north wing, and the expansion of the king's private apartment , which required the demolition of the Ambassadors' Staircase. In 1748, Louis XV began construction of a palace theatre, the Royal Opera of Versailles at the northernmost end of the palace, but completion was delayed until 1770; construction was interrupted in the 1740s by the War of the Austrian Succession and then again in 1756 with

440-449: A general hospital with high tech facilities, supermarkets or malls, which were destroyed in 1997. Gbadolite had also College Presidentiel , a high school famous for its academic excellence and administered by Jesuit Fathers to whom Mobutu gave the school. This school had a chemistry lab, physics lab, computer lab, Olympic game facilities, and band instruments of all kinds. The town was also famous for its Chapelle Marie la Misericorde ,

550-572: A Japanese samurai and ambassador, sent to Rome by Date Masamune , landed at Saint-Tropez for a few days. In 1636, Guillaume Courtet , a French Dominican priest, reciprocated when he set foot in Japan. Also in 1615, Marie de' Medici incorporated the merchants of Dieppe and other harbours to found the Company of the Moluccas . In 1619, an armed expedition composed of three ships (275 crew, 106 cannon) and called

660-474: A feature dubbed the enveloppe . This gave the château a new, Italianate façade overlooking the gardens, but preserved the courtyard façade, resulting in a mix of styles and materials that dismayed Louis XIV and that Colbert described as a "patchwork". Attempts to homogenize the two façades failed, and in 1670 Le Vau died, leaving the post of First Architect to the King vacant for the next seven years. Le Vau

770-420: A forecourt to the château. But in 1668–69, as a response to the growth of the gardens, and victory over Spain in the War of Devolution , Louis XIV decided to turn Versailles into a full-scale royal residence. He vacillated between replacing or incorporating his father's château, but settled on the latter by the end of the decade, and from 1668 to 1671, Louis XIII's château was encased on three sides in

880-578: A great influence on architecture and horticulture from the mid-17th century to the end of the 18th century. Examples of works influenced by Versailles include Christopher Wren 's work at Hampton Court Palace , Berlin Palace , the Palace of La Granja , Stockholm Palace , Ludwigsburg Palace , Karlsruhe Palace , Rastatt Palace , Nymphenburg Palace , Schleissheim Palace , and Esterházy Palace . The construction in 1668–1671 of Louis Le Vau 's enveloppe around

990-464: A halt when Louis Philippe was overthrown in 1848, though the paintings of French heroes and great battles still remain in the south wing. Emperor Napoleon III used the palace on occasion as a stage for grand ceremonies. One of the most lavish was the banquet that he hosted for Queen Victoria in the Royal Opera of Versailles on 25 August 1855. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871,

1100-480: A luxurious church in which Mobutu buried his first wife, Mama Mobutu . Two palaces were built outside Gbadolite at Kawele . One was an elaborate complex of Chinese pagodas , while the other was a modern mansion. Both were used as residences for Mobutu and guests. The three-story palace in Gbadolite was used primarily for public functions. Mobutu also built a nuclear bunker that could house more than 500 people and

1210-652: A major role in Louis XIII's reign from 1624, determining France's direction over the course of the next eighteen years. As a result of Richelieu's work, Louis XIII became one of the first examples of an absolute monarch . Under Louis and Richelieu, the crown successfully intervened in the Thirty Years' War against the Habsburgs, managed to keep the French nobility in line, and retracted the political and military privileges granted to

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1320-505: A new restoration initiative – the "Grand Versailles" project – was started, which began with the replanting of the gardens, which had lost over 10,000 trees during Cyclone Lothar on 26 December 1999. One part of the initiative, the restoration of the Hall of Mirrors , was completed in 2006. Another major project was the further restoration of the backstage areas of the Royal Opera of Versailles in 2007 to 2009. The Palace of Versailles

1430-402: A protégé of Mazarin and enemy of Fouquet, and charged him with managing the corps of artisans in royal employment. Colbert acted as the intermediary between them and Louis XIV, who personally directed and inspected the planning and construction of Versailles. Work at Versailles was at first concentrated on gardens , and through the 1660s, Le Vau only added two detached service wings and

1540-528: A restored budget and large workforce of former soldiers. Mansart began his tenure with the addition from 1678 to 1681 of the Hall of Mirrors , a renovation of the courtyard façade of Louis XIII's château, and the expansion of d'Orbay's pavilions to create the Ministers' Wings in 1678–79. Adjacent to the palace, Hardouin-Mansart built a pair of stables called the Grande and Petite Écuries from 1679 to 1682 and

1650-504: A rooster, and Alexander the Great and Ptolemy surrounded by scholars and philosophers. The Automaton Clock was made for the King by the royal clockmaker Antoine Morand in 1706. When it chimes the hour, figures of Louis XIV and Fame descend from a cloud. Louis XIII Louis XIII ( French pronunciation: [lwi tʁɛz] ; sometimes called the Just ; 27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643)

1760-545: A sexual relationship. Gédéon Tallemant des Réaux , drawing from rumours told to him by a critic of the King (the Marquise de Rambouillet ), explicitly speculated in his Historiettes about what happened in the king's bed. A further liaison with an equerry , François de Baradas, ended when the latter lost favour fighting a duel after duelling had been forbidden by royal decree. Louis was also captivated by Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis of Cinq-Mars , 19 years his younger, who

1870-456: A tradition of cementing military and political alliances between the Catholic powers of France and Spain with royal marriages. The tradition went back to the marriage of Louis VII of France and Constance of Castile . The marriage was only briefly happy, and the King's duties often kept them apart. After 23 years of marriage and four stillbirths, Anne finally gave birth to a son on 5 September 1638,

1980-620: A week, from six to ten in the evening, with various entertainments. This was originally a chapel. It was rebuilt beginning in 1712 under the supervision of the First Architect to the King , Robert de Cotte , to showcase two paintings by Paolo Veronese , Eleazar and Rebecca and Meal at the House of Simon the Pharisee , which was a gift to Louis XIV from the Republic of Venice in 1664. The painting on

2090-574: Is a former royal residence commissioned by King Louis XIV located in Versailles , about 18 kilometres (11 mi) west of Paris , France . The palace is owned by the government of France and since 1995 has been managed, under the direction of the French Ministry of Culture , by the Public Establishment of the Palace, Museum and National Estate of Versailles . About 15,000,000 people visit

2200-399: Is a visual history of French architecture from the 1630s to the 1780s. Its earliest portion, the corps de logis , was built for Louis XIII in the style of his reign with brick, marble, and slate , which Le Vau surrounded in the 1660s with Enveloppe , an edifice that was inspired by Renaissance-era Italian villas. When Jules Hardouin-Mansart made further expansions to the palace in

2310-422: Is currently owned by the French state. Its formal title is the Public Establishment of the Palace, Museum and National Estate of Versailles . Since 1995, it has been run as a Public Establishment, with an independent administration and management supervised by the French Ministry of Culture . The grounds of the palace hosted the equestrian competition during the 2024 Summer Olympics . The Palace of Versailles

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2420-499: The Académie française , and ending the revolt of the French nobility . They systematically destroyed the castles of defiant lords, and denounced the use of private violence (dueling, carrying weapons, and maintaining private armies). By the end of the 1620s, Richelieu had established "the royal monopoly of force" as the ruling doctrine. The king's reign was also marked by the struggles against

2530-573: The Battle of Ponts-de-Cé on 7 August 1620. Louis then launched an expedition against the Huguenots of Béarn who had defied a number of royal decisions. This expedition managed to re-establish Catholicism as the official religion of Béarn. However, the Béarn expedition drove Huguenots in other provinces into a rebellion led by Henri, Duke of Rohan . In 1621 Louis XIII was formally reconciled with his mother. Luynes

2640-679: The Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye . The site, near a village named Versailles, was a wooded wetland that Louis XIII's court scorned as being generally unworthy of a king; one of his courtiers, François de Bassompierre , wrote that the lodge "would not inspire vanity in even the simplest gentleman". From 1631 to 1634, architect Philibert Le Roy replaced the lodge with a château for Louis XIII, who forbade his queen, Anne of Austria , from staying there overnight, even when an outbreak of smallpox at Saint-Germain-en-Laye in 1641 forced Louis XIII to relocate to Versailles with his three-year-old heir,

2750-505: The Grand Commun  [ fr ] , which housed the palace's servants and general kitchens, from 1682 to 1684. Hardouin-Mansart also added two entirely new wings in Le Vau's Italianate style to house the court, first at the south end of the palace from 1679 to 1681 and then at its north end from 1685 to 1689. War and the resulting diminished funding slowed construction at Versailles for

2860-454: The Grand Trianon restored and refurnished as a springtime residence for himself and his family, in the style of furnishing that it is seen today. In 1815, with the final downfall of Napoleon, Louis XVIII , the younger brother of Louis XVI, became king, and considered returning the royal residence to Versailles, where he had been born. He ordered the restoration of the royal apartments, but

2970-844: The Huguenots and Habsburg Spain . Born at the Palace of Fontainebleau , Louis XIII was the eldest child of King Henry IV of France and his second wife Marie de' Medici . As son of the king, he was a Fils de France ("son of France"), and as the eldest son, Dauphin of France . His father Henry IV was the first French king of the House of Bourbon , having succeeded his second cousin, Henry III (1574–1589), in application of Salic law . Louis XIII's paternal grandparents were Antoine de Bourbon, duc de Vendôme , and Jeanne d'Albret , Queen of Navarre. His maternal grandparents were Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany , and Joanna of Austria, Grand Duchess of Tuscany . Eleonora de' Medici , his maternal aunt,

3080-567: The Louvre Palace . In foreign matters, Louis organised the development and administration of New France , expanding its settlements westward along the Saint Lawrence River from Quebec City to Montreal . In order to continue the exploration efforts of his predecessor Henry IV, Louis XIII considered a colonial venture in Morocco , and sent a fleet under Isaac de Razilly in 1619. Razilly

3190-809: The Treaty of Paris at the Hôtel d'York (now 56 Rue Jacob) in Paris, granting the United States independence. On 4 September, Spain and France signed separate treaties with Britain at the Palace of Versailles, formally ending the war. The King and Queen learned of the Storming of the Bastille in Paris on 14 July 1789, while they were at the palace, and remained isolated there as the Revolution in Paris spread. The growing anger in Paris led to

3300-593: The Ugandan backed MLC ( Mouvement de Libération du Congo ) rebel group, led by Jean-Pierre Bemba , captured Gbadolite from Kabila's government and it became the MLC's headquarters. 4°17′N 21°01′E  /  4.283°N 21.017°E  / 4.283; 21.017 Palace of Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( / v ɛər ˈ s aɪ , v ɜːr ˈ s aɪ / vair- SY , vur- SY ; French : château de Versailles [ʃɑto d(ə) vɛʁsɑj] )

3410-530: The Women's March on Versailles on 5 October 1789. A crowd of several thousand men and women, protesting the high price and scarcity of bread, marched from the markets of Paris to Versailles. They took weapons from the city armoury, besieged the palace, and compelled the King and royal family and the members of the National Constituent Assembly to return with them to Paris the following day. As soon as

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3520-446: The château neuf , with three rooms in each apartment facing the garden to the west and four facing the garden parterres to the north and south, respectively. The private apartments of the king (the appartement du roi and the petit appartement du roi ) and those of the queen (the petit appartement de la reine ) remained in the château vieux (old château). Le Vau's design for the state apartments closely followed Italian models of

3630-735: The grand appartement du roi . After the addition of the Hall of Mirrors (1678–1684) the king's apartment was reduced to five rooms (until the reign of Louis XV , when two more rooms were added) and the queen's to four. The queen's apartments served as the residence of three queens of France – Maria Theresa of Spain , wife of Louis XIV , Maria Leszczyńska , wife of Louis XV, and Marie Antoinette , wife of Louis XVI . Additionally, Louis XIV's granddaughter-in-law, Princess Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy , duchess of Burgundy, wife of Louis, Duke of Burgundy , occupied these rooms from 1697 (the year of her marriage) to her death in 1712. The Ambassadors' Staircase  [ fr ] ( Escalier des Ambassadeurs )

3740-499: The princes of the blood , Louis XIV's extended family, for influence over him. In the aftermath of the Fronde, Louis XIV became determined to rule alone. Following Mazarin's death in 1661, Louis XIV reformed his government to exclude his mother and the princes of the blood, moved the court back to Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and ordered the expansion of his father's château at Versailles into a palace. Louis XIV had hunted at Versailles in

3850-615: The "Fleet of Montmorency" under General Augustin de Beaulieu was sent from Honfleur, to fight the Dutch in the Far East . In 1624, with the Treaty of Compiègne , Cardinal Richelieu obtained an agreement to halt the Dutch–French warfare in the Far East. Twice the king's younger brother, Gaston, Duke of Orléans, had to leave France for conspiring against his government and for attempting to undermine

3960-532: The 1618 revocation of the paulette tax and by the sale of offices in 1620. From her exile in Blois, Marie de' Medici became the obvious rallying point for this discontent, and the Bishop of Luçon (who became Cardinal Richelieu in 1622) was allowed to act as her chief adviser, serving as a go-between Marie and the King. French nobles launched a rebellion on 2 July 1620, but their forces were easily routed by royal forces at

4070-527: The 1650s, but did not take any special interest in Versailles until 1661. On 17 August 1661, Louis XIV was a guest at a sumptuous festival hosted by Nicolas Fouquet , the Superintendent of Finances , at his palatial residence, the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte . Louis XIV was impressed by the château and its gardens, which were the work of Louis Le Vau , the court architect since 1654, André Le Nôtre ,

4180-551: The 1680s, he used the Enveloppe as the model for his work. Neoclassical additions were made to the palace with the remodelling of the Ministers' Wings in the 1770s, by Ange-Jacques Gabriel , and after the Bourbon Restoration . The palace was largely completed by the death of Louis XIV in 1715. The eastern facing palace has a U-shaped layout, with the corps de logis and symmetrical advancing secondary wings terminating with

4290-567: The Commune at the end of May was directed from Versailles, and the prisoners of the Commune were marched there and put on trial in military courts. In 1875 a second parliamentary body, the French Senate , was created and held its meetings for the election of a President of the Republic in a new hall created in 1876 in the south wing of the palace. The French Senate and National Assembly continue to meet in

4400-622: The Dufour Pavilion on the south and the Gabriel Pavilion to the north, creating an expansive cour d'honneur known as the Royal Court (Cour Royale). Flanking the Royal Court are two enormous asymmetrical wings that result in a façade of 402 metres (1,319 ft) in length. Covered by around 10 hectares (1.1 million square feet) of roof, the palace has 2,143 windows, 1,252 chimneys, and 67 staircases. The palace and its grounds have had

4510-412: The Dutch via the Treaty of Compiègne . However, La Vieuville was dismissed by the middle of 1624, partly due to his bad behaviour (during his tenure as superintendent he was arrogant and incompetent) and because of a well-organized pamphlet campaign by Cardinal Richelieu against his council rival. Louis needed a new chief advisor; Cardinal Richelieu would be that counsellor. Cardinal Richelieu played

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4620-706: The English they were to vacate all lands north of Pemaquid. This resulted in all the French interests in Acadia being restored. In Brazil , the colony of Equinoctial France was established in 1612, but only lasted 4 years until it was eliminated by the Portuguese. In 1642, Louis XIII authorised French subjects to engage in the Atlantic slave trade provided those they enslaved were converted to Christianity. France-Japan relations started under Louis XIII in 1615 when Hasekura Tsunenaga ,

4730-419: The Huguenots by Henry IV (while maintaining their religious freedoms). Louis XIII successfully led the important Siege of La Rochelle . In addition, Louis had the port of Le Havre modernised, and he built a powerful navy. Louis also worked to reverse the trend of promising French artists leaving for Italy to work and study. He commissioned the painters Nicolas Poussin and Philippe de Champaigne to decorate

4840-573: The Huguenots retained control of Montauban and La Rochelle . Louis ultimately dismissed Noël Brûlart de Sillery and Pierre Brûlart in 1624 because of his displeasure with how they handled the diplomatic situation over the Valtellina with Spain . Valtellina was an area with Catholic inhabitants under the suzerainty of the Protestant Three Leagues . It served as an important route to Italy for France and it provided an easy connection between

4950-574: The Huguenots. The 1622 campaign, however, followed the pattern of the previous year: royal forces won some early victories, but were unable to complete a siege, this time at the fortress of Montpellier . The rebellion was ended by the Treaty of Montpellier , signed by Louis XIII and the Duke of Rohan in October 1622. The treaty confirmed the tenets of the Edict of Nantes: several Huguenot fortresses were to be razed, but

5060-501: The Indians who will be brought to the knowledge of the faith and will profess it, shall be deemed and renowned natural Frenchmen, and as such may come to live in France when they want, and acquire, donate, and succeed and accept donations and legacies, just as true French subjects, without being required to take letters of declaration of naturalization." Acadia was also developed under Louis XIII. In 1632, Isaac de Razilly became involved, at

5170-572: The King [James] my master: the King [Louis] assured me of a reciprocal affection to the King [James] my master, and of my particular welcome to his Court: his words were never many, as being so extream [ sic ] a stutterer that he would sometimes hold his tongue out of his mouth a good while before he could speak so much as one word; he had besides a double row of teeth, and was observed seldom or never to spit or blow his nose, or to sweat much, 'tho he were very laborious, and almost indefatigable in his exercises of hunting and hawking, to which he

5280-630: The King. The 7-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart played several works during his stay and later dedicated his first two harpsichord sonatas, published in 1764 in Paris, to Madame Victoria , daughter of Louis XV. In 1783, the palace was the site of the signing of the last two of the three treaties of the Peace of Paris (1783) , which ended the American Revolutionary War . On 3 September, British and American delegates, led by Benjamin Franklin , signed

5390-602: The Queen and Concini. In the meantime, Louis XIII decided, with the encouragement of Charles d'Albert (the Grand Falconer of France ) and other advisers, to break with his mother and to arrest Concini. On 24 April 1617, during the attempted arrest, Concini was killed. His widow Leonora Dori Galigaï was tried for witchcraft, condemned, beheaded, and burned on 8 July 1617, and Marie was sent into exile in Blois . Later, Louis conferred

5500-584: The Spanish and the Holy Roman empires, especially in helping each other with armies if necessary. Spain was constantly interfering in the Valtellina, which angered Louis, as he wanted to hold possession of this strategically important passageway. He therefore found a better servitor in his Superintendent of Finances Charles de La Vieuville , who held similar views of Spain as the king, and who advised Louis to side with

5610-484: The accumulation of minor problems, may have killed him, not to mention physiological weaknesses that made him prone to disease or his doctors' remedies of enemas and bleedings , which continued right to his death." Louis XIII shared his mother's love of the lute , developed in her childhood in Florence. One of his first toys was a lute and his personal doctor, Jean Héroard, reports him playing it for his mother in 1604, at

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5720-458: The age of three. In 1635, Louis XIII composed the music, wrote the libretto and designed the costumes for the " Ballet de la Merlaison ." The king himself danced in two performances of the ballet the same year at Chantilly and Royaumont. In the sphere of men's fashion , Louis helped introduce the wearing of wigs among men in 1624. This fashion spread in Europe and European-influenced countries in

5830-597: The armistice in March 1871. In that month, the government of the new Third French Republic , which had departed Paris during the war for Tours and then Bordeaux , moved into the palace. The National Assembly held its meetings in the Opera House. The uprising of the Paris Commune in March 1871, prevented the French government, under Adolphe Thiers , from returning immediately to Paris. The military operation which suppressed

5940-491: The ceiling illustrate mythological themes. The Salon of Mercury was the original State Bedchamber when Louis XIV officially moved the court and government to the palace in 1682. The bed is a replica of the original commissioned by King Louis-Philippe in the 19th century when he turned the palace into a museum. The ceiling paintings by the Flemish artist Jean Baptiste de Champaigne depict the god Mercury in his chariot, drawn by

6050-409: The ceiling over the door opposite the windows. This salon was used for serving light meals during evening receptions. The principal feature in this room is Jean Warin 's life-size statue of Louis XIV in the costume of a Roman emperor. On the ceiling in a gilded oval frame is another painting by Houasse, Venus subjugating the Gods and Powers (1672–1681). Trompe-l'œil paintings and sculpture around

6160-420: The ceiling, The Apotheosis of Hercules , by François Lemoyne , was completed in 1736, and gave the room its name. The Salon of Abundance was the antechamber to the Cabinet of Curios (now the Games Room), which displayed Louis XIV's collection of precious jewels and rare objects. Some of the objects in the collection are depicted in René-Antoine Houasse 's painting Abundance and Liberality (1683), located on

6270-432: The centralization of royal power. Louis XIV first used Versailles to promote himself with a series of nighttime festivals in its gardens in 1664, 1668, and 1674, the events of which were disseminated throughout Europe by print and engravings. As early as 1669, but especially from 1678, Louis XIV sought to make Versailles his seat of government, and he expanded the palace so as to fit the court within it. The moving of

6380-570: The construction of townhouses that resembled the palace began in 1671. The next year, the Franco-Dutch War began and funding for Versailles was cut until 1674, when Louis XIV had work begun on the Ambassadors' Staircase  [ fr ] , a grand staircase for the reception of guests, and demolished the last of the village of Versailles. Following the end of the Franco-Dutch War with French victory in 1678, Louis XIV appointed as First Architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart , an experienced architect in Louis XIV's confidence, who would benefit from

6490-441: The country, and Marie was able to raise her own army. Nevertheless, Marie agreed to call an Estates General assembly to address Condé's grievances. The assembly of this Estates General was delayed until Louis XIII formally came of age on his thirteenth birthday. Although his coming-of-age formally ended Marie's Regency, she remained the de facto ruler of France. The Estates General accomplished little, spending its time discussing

6600-449: The court to Versailles did not come until 1682, however, and not officially, as opinion on Versailles was mixed among the nobility of France . By 1687, however, it was evident to all that Versailles was the de facto capital of France, and Louis XIV succeeded in attracting the nobility to Versailles to pursue prestige and royal patronage within a strict court etiquette, thus eroding their traditional provincial power bases. It

6710-400: The creation of the Museum of the History of France , dedicated to "all the glories of France", which had been used to house some members of the royal family. The museum was begun in 1833 and inaugurated on 30 June 1837. Its most famous room is the Galerie des Batailles (Hall of Battles), which lies on most of the length of the second floor of the south wing. The museum project largely came to

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6820-421: The day, including the placement of the apartments on the main floor (the piano nobile , the next floor up from the ground level), a convention the architect borrowed from Italian palace design. The king's State Apartment consisted of an enfilade of seven rooms, each dedicated to one of the known planets and their associated titular Roman deity . The queen's apartment formed a parallel enfilade with that of

6930-468: The establishment of a consulate, and freedom of religion for French subjects. Unlike other colonial powers, France, under the guidance of Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu, encouraged a peaceful coexistence in New France between the natives and the colonists. Indians, converted to Catholicism, were considered as "natural Frenchmen" by the Ordonnance of 1627: "The descendants of the French who are accustomed to this country [New France], together with all

7040-432: The first landing of the staircase. The construction of the Hall of Mirrors between 1678 and 1686 coincided with a major alteration to the State Apartments. They were originally intended as his residence, but the King transformed them into galleries for his finest paintings, and venues for his many receptions for courtiers. During the season from All-Saints Day in November until Easter , these were usually held three times

7150-477: The following offspring: Voltaire claimed in the second edition of Questions sur l'Encyclopédie (1771) that before Louis XIV was born, Louis XIII had an illegitimate son, who was jailed and his face hidden beneath an iron mask (see the Man in the Iron Mask ). There is no evidence that Louis kept mistresses (a distinction that earned him the title "Louis the Chaste "), but several reports suggest that he may have been homosexual. The prolonged temporal gap between

7260-429: The future Louis XIV . When Louis XIII died in 1643, Anne became Louis XIV's regent , and Louis XIII's château was abandoned for the next decade. She moved the court back to Paris, where Anne and her chief minister , Cardinal Mazarin , continued Louis XIII's unpopular monetary practices. This led to the Fronde , a series of revolts against royal authority from 1648 to 1653 that masked a struggle between Mazarin and

7370-422: The future Louis XIV . Many people regarded this birth as a miracle and, in show of gratitude to God for the long-awaited birth of an heir, his parents named him Louis- Dieudonné ("God-given"). As another sign of gratitude, according to several interpretations, seven months before his birth, France was dedicated by Louis XIII to the Virgin Mary , who, many believed, had interceded for the perceived miracle. But

7480-487: The influence of his mother and Cardinal Richelieu. After waging an unsuccessful war in Languedoc , he took refuge in Flanders . In 1643, on the death of Louis XIII, Gaston became lieutenant-general of the kingdom and fought against Spain on the northern frontiers of France. On 24 November 1615, Louis XIII married Anne of Austria , daughter of Philip III of Spain . The couple were second cousins, by mutual descent from Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor . This marriage followed

7590-442: The more costly endeavours for the museum and the French Fifth Republic has been to repurchase as much of the original furnishings as possible. Consequently, because furniture with a royal provenance – and especially furniture that was made for Versailles – is a highly sought-after commodity on the international market, the museum has spent considerable funds on retrieving much of the palace's original furnishings. In 2003,

7700-407: The objective was to restore the palace to its state – or as close to it as possible – in 1789 when the royal family left the palace. Among the early projects was the repair of the roof over the Hall of Mirrors; the publicity campaign brought international attention to the plight of post-war Versailles and garnered much foreign money including a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation . One of

7810-436: The one hand, France's traditional rivalry with the House of Habsburg argued in favour of intervening on behalf of the Protestant powers (and Louis's father Henry IV of France had once been a Huguenot leader). On the other hand, Louis XIII had a strict Catholic upbringing, and his natural inclination was to support the Holy Roman Emperor , the Habsburg Ferdinand II . The French nobles were further antagonised against Luynes by

7920-463: The outside of Louis XIII 's red brick and white stone château added state apartments for the king and the queen. The addition was known at the time as the château neuf (new château). The grands appartements (Grand Apartments, also referred to as the State Apartments ) include the grand appartement du roi and the grand appartement de la reine . They occupied the main or principal floor of

8030-464: The palace in joint session on special occasions, such as the amendment of the Constitution of France . The end of the 19th and the early 20th century saw the beginning of restoration efforts at the palace, first led by Pierre de Nolhac , poet and scholar and the first conservator, who began his work in 1892. The conservation and restoration were interrupted by two world wars but have continued until

8140-527: The palace the de facto capital of France. This state of affairs was continued by Kings Louis XV and Louis XVI , who primarily made interior alterations to the palace, but in 1789 the royal family and French court returned to Paris. For the rest of the French Revolution , the Palace of Versailles was largely abandoned and emptied of its contents, and the population of the surrounding city plummeted. Napoleon , following his coronation as Emperor , used

8250-505: The palace was occupied by the general staff of the victorious German Army. Parts of the château, including the Hall of Mirrors, were turned into a military hospital. The creation of the German Empire , combining Prussia and the surrounding German states under William I , was formally proclaimed in the Hall of Mirrors on 18 January 1871. The Germans remained in the palace until the signing of

8360-437: The palace, including the furniture, mirrors, baths, and kitchen equipment, were sold in seventeen thousand lots. All fleurs-de-lys and royal emblems on the buildings were chambered or chiselled off. The empty buildings were turned into a storehouse for furnishings, art and libraries confiscated from the nobility. The empty grand apartments were opened for tours beginning in 1793, and a small museum of French paintings and art school

8470-444: The palace, park, or gardens of Versailles every year, making it one of the most popular tourist attractions in the world. Louis XIII built a hunting lodge at Versailles in 1623. His successor, Louis XIV expanded the château into a palace that went through several expansions in phases from 1661 to 1715. It was a favourite residence for both kings, and in 1682, Louis XIV moved the seat of his court and government to Versailles, making

8580-473: The palace. More work took place after World War II, with the restoration of the Royal Opera of Versailles . The theatre was reopened in 1957, in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. In 1978, parts of the palace were heavily damaged in a bombing committed by Breton terrorists . Starting in the 1950s, when the museum of Versailles was under the directorship of Gérald van der Kemp,

8690-566: The present day. The palace returned to the world stage in June 1919, when, after six months of negotiations, the Treaty of Versailles , formally ending the First World War, was signed in the Hall of Mirrors . Between 1925 and 1928, the American philanthropist and multi-millionaire John D. Rockefeller, Jr. gave $ 2,166,000, the equivalent of about thirty million dollars today, to restore and refurbish

8800-415: The queen's pregnancies may have been a result of Louis XIII's aversion to heterosexual activity, a matter of great political consequence, since it took the couple more than 20 years of marriage before Louis XIV's birth. His interests as a teenager were focused on male courtiers and he developed an intense emotional attachment to his favourite, Charles d'Albert , although some say there is no clear evidence of

8910-478: The relationship of France to the Papacy and the venality of offices, but reaching no resolutions. Beginning in 1615, Marie came to rely increasingly on Concino Concini , an Italian who assumed the role of her favourite, and was widely unpopular because he was a foreigner. This further antagonised Condé, who launched another rebellion in the early months of 1616. Huguenot leaders supported Condé's rebellion, which led

9020-520: The remodelling of the courtyard façade in the Italianate style. Louis XIV and Hardouin-Mansart focused on a permanent palace chapel , the construction of which lasted from 1699 to 1710. Louis XIV's successors, Louis XV and Louis XVI , largely left Versailles as they inherited it and focused on the palace's interiors. Louis XV's modifications began in the 1730s, with the completion of the Salon d'Hercule ,

9130-495: The request of Cardinal Richelieu, in the colonization of Acadia, by taking possession of Port-Royal (now Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia ) and developing it into a French colony. The King gave Razilly the official title of lieutenant-general for New France . He took on military tasks such as taking control of Fort Pentagouet at Majabigwaduce on the Penobscot Bay , which had been given to France in an earlier Treaty, and to inform

9240-465: The rest of the 17th century. The Nine Years' War , which began in 1688, stopped work altogether until 1698. Three years later, however, the even more expensive War of the Spanish Succession began and, combined with poor harvests in 1693–94 and 1709–10, plunged France into crisis. Louis XIV thus slashed funding and cancelled some of the work Hardouin-Mansart had planned in the 1680s, such as

9350-603: The royal family departed, the palace was closed. In 1792, the National Convention , the new revolutionary government, ordered the transfer of all the paintings and sculptures from the palace to the Louvre . In 1793, the Convention declared the abolition of the monarchy and ordered all of the royal property in the palace to be sold at auction. The auction took place between 25 August 1793 and 11 August 1794. The furnishings and art of

9460-427: The royal family to the Château de Saint-Cloud ahead of more renovations to the Palace of Versailles, but construction could not begin because of financial difficulty and political crisis . In 1789, the French Revolution swept the royal family and government out of Versailles forever. The Palace of Versailles was key to Louis XIV's politics, as an expression and concentration of French art and culture , and for

9570-400: The royal gardener since 1657, and Charles Le Brun , a painter in royal service since 1647. Vaux-le-Vicomte's scale and opulence led him to imprison Fouquet that September, as he had also built an island fortress and a private army. But Louis XIV was also inspired by Vaux-le-Vicomte, and he recruited its authors for his own projects. Louis XIV replaced Fouquet with Jean-Baptiste Colbert ,

9680-559: The staircase were trompe-l'œil paintings of people from the Four Parts of the World looking into the staircase over a balustrade, a motif repeated on the ceiling fresco. There they were joined by allegorical figures for the twelve months of the year and various Classical Greek figures such as the Muses . A marble bust of Louis XIV, sculpted by Jean Warin in 1665–66, was placed in a niche above

9790-516: The staircase – famously lit naturally with a skylight – so as to overawe visitors. The staircase and walls of the room that contained it were clad in polychrome marble and gilded bronze, with decor in the Ionic order. Charles Le Brun painted the walls and ceiling of the room according to a festive theme to celebrate Louis XIV's victory in the Franco-Dutch War . On the wall immediately above

9900-595: The start of the Seven Years' War . These wars emptied the royal treasury and thereafter construction was mostly funded by Madame du Barry , Louis XV's favourite mistress. In 1771, Louis XV had the northern Ministers' Wing rebuilt in Neoclassical style by Ange-Jacques Gabriel , his court architect, as it was in the process of falling down. That work was also stopped by financial constraints, and it remained incomplete when Louis XV died in 1774. In 1784, Louis XVI briefly moved

10010-441: The subsidiary palace, Grand Trianon , as a summer residence from 1810 to 1814, but did not use the main palace. Following the Bourbon Restoration , when the king was returned to the throne, he resided in Paris and it was not until the 1830s that meaningful repairs were made to the palace. A museum of French history was installed within it, replacing the courtiers apartments of the southern wing. The palace and park were designated

10120-573: The task and cost was too great. Louis XVIII had the far end of the south wing of the Cour Royale demolished and rebuilt (1814–1824) to match the Gabriel wing of 1780 opposite, which gave greater uniformity of appearance to the front entrance. Neither he nor his successor Charles X lived at Versailles. The French Revolution of 1830 brought a new monarch, Louis-Philippe to power, and a new ambition for Versailles. He did not reside at Versailles but began

10230-561: The text of the dedication does not mention the royal pregnancy and birth as one of its reasons, and Louis XIII himself is said to have expressed his scepticism with regard to the miracle after his son's birth. In gratitude for having successfully given birth, the queen founded the Benedictine abbey of the Val-de-Grâce , for which Louis XIV laid the cornerstone of its church , an early masterpiece of French Baroque architecture. The couple had

10340-402: The title of Duke of Luynes on Charles d'Albert. Luynes soon became as unpopular as Concini had been. Other nobles resented his monopolisation of the King. Luynes was seen as less competent than Henry IV's ministers, many now elderly or deceased, who had surrounded Marie de' Medici. The Thirty Years' War broke out in 1618. The French court was initially unsure of which side to support. On

10450-448: The young Louis XIII to conclude that they would never be loyal subjects. Eventually, Condé and Queen Marie made peace with the ratification on 3 May of the Treaty of Loudun , which allowed Condé great power in government but did not remove Concini. However, on 1 September, after growing dissatisfaction from nobles due to Concini's position, Queen Marie, with Louis's help, imprisoned Condé to protect Concini, leading to renewed revolts against

10560-509: The young king to take power in 1617 by exiling his mother and executing her followers, including Concino Concini , the most influential Italian at the French court. Louis XIII, taciturn and suspicious, relied heavily on his chief ministers, first Charles d'Albert, duc de Luynes and then Cardinal Richelieu , to govern the Kingdom of France . The King and the Cardinal are remembered for establishing

10670-468: Was King of France from 1610 until his death in 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II ) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown. Shortly before his ninth birthday, Louis became king of France and Navarre after his father Henry IV was assassinated. His mother, Marie de' Medici , acted as regent during his minority. Mismanagement of the kingdom and ceaseless political intrigues by Marie and her Italian favourites led

10780-711: Was able to explore the coast as far as Mogador . In 1624 he was given charge of an embassy to the pirate harbour of Salé in Morocco, in order to solve the affair of the Zaydani Library of Mulay Zidan . In 1630, Razilly was able to negotiate the purchase of French slaves from the Moroccans. He visited Morocco again in 1631, and helped negotiate the Franco-Moroccan Treaty (1631) . The treaty gave France preferential treatment, known as capitulations : preferential tariffs,

10890-399: Was an imperial staircase built from 1674 to 1680 by François d'Orbay . Until Louis XV had it demolished in 1752 to create a courtyard for his private apartments, the staircase was the primary entrance into the Palace of Versailles and the royal apartments especially. It was entered from the courtyard via a vestibule that, cramped and dark, contrasted greatly with the tall, open space of

11000-637: Was appointed Constable of France , after which he and Louis set out to quell the Huguenot rebellion. The siege at the Huguenot stronghold of Montauban had to be abandoned after three months owing to the large number of royal troops who had succumbed to camp fever. One of the victims of camp fever was Luynes, who died in December 1621. Following the death of Luynes, Louis determined that he would rule by council. His mother returned from exile and, in 1622, entered this council, where Condé recommended violent suppression of

11110-601: Was at the Palace of Versailles that Louis XIV received the Doge of Genoa , Francesco Maria Imperiale Lercari in 1685, an embassy from the Ayutthaya Kingdom in 1686, and an embassy from Safavid Iran in 1715. Louis XIV died at Versailles on 1 September 1715 and was succeeded by his five-year-old great-grandson, Louis XV , then the duke of Anjou , who was moved to the Château de Vincennes and then to Paris by Louis XV's regent, Philippe II, Duke of Orléans . Versailles

11220-406: Was his godmother . As a child, he was raised under the supervision of the royal governess Françoise de Montglat . The ambassador of King James I of England to the court of France, Sir Edward Herbert , who presented his credentials to Louis XIII in 1619, remarked on Louis's extreme congenital speech impediment and his double teeth : ...I presented to the King [Louis] a letter of credence from

11330-438: Was later executed for conspiring with the Spanish enemy in time of war. Tallemant described how on a royal journey, the King "sent M. le Grand [de Cinq-Mars] to undress, who returned, adorned like a bride. 'To bed, to bed' he said to him impatiently... and the mignon was not in before the king was already kissing his hands. But he did not find that M. le Grand, whose heart was elsewhere, responded to his great ardour." Louis XIII

11440-400: Was much addicted... Louis XIII ascended the throne in 1610 upon the assassination of his father, and his mother Marie de' Medici acted as his Regent . Although Louis XIII came of age at thirteen (1614), his mother did not give up her position as Regent until 1617, when he was 16. Marie maintained most of her husband's ministers, with the exception of Maximilien de Béthune, Duke of Sully , who

11550-401: Was neglected until 1722, when Philippe II removed the court to Versailles to escape the unpopularity of his regency, and when Louis XV began his majority. The 1715 move, however, broke the cultural power of Versailles, and during the reign of Louis XVI , courtiers spent their leisure in Paris, not Versailles. During Christmas 1763, Mozart and his family visited Versailles and dined with

11660-659: Was opened in some of the empty rooms. By virtue of an order issued by the Versailles district directorate in August 1794, the Royal Gate was destroyed, the Cour Royale was cleared and the Cour de Marbre lost its precious floor. When Napoleon became Emperor of the French in 1804, he considered making Versailles his residence but abandoned the idea because of the cost of the renovation. Prior to his marriage with Marie-Louise in 1810, he had

11770-535: Was succeeded at Versailles by his assistant, architect François d'Orbay . Work at the palace during the 1670s focused on its interiors, as the palace was then nearing completion, though d'Orbay expanded Le Vau's service wings and connected them to the château, and built a pair of pavilions for government employees in the forecourt. In 1670, d'Orbay was tasked by Louis XIV with designing a city, also called Versailles , to house and service Louis XIV's growing government and court. The granting of land to courtiers for

11880-585: Was the largest in Africa; this was the only nuclear bunker in Central Africa. The bunker was connected to the Ubangui River by a secret tunnel, giving access to the military harbour at the village of N'dangi . When Laurent Kabila successfully led a rebellion and ousted Mobutu in 1997, Gbadolite was raided, and most of what was in the palaces was looted. The palaces are now being overrun by vegetation. In 1998,

11990-570: Was unpopular in the country. She mainly relied on Nicolas de Neufville, seigneur de Villeroy , Noël Brûlart de Sillery , and Pierre Jeannin for political advice. Marie pursued a moderate policy, confirming the Edict of Nantes . She was not, however, able to prevent rebellion by nobles such as Henri, Prince of Condé (1588–1646) , second in line to the throne after Marie's second surviving son Gaston, Duke of Orléans . Condé squabbled with Marie in 1614, and briefly raised an army, but he found little support in

12100-650: Was unwell during the winter of 1642–1643. He managed a few hunting trips to Versailles, but by the middle of February was mostly bedridden. From contemporary descriptions, modern historians have surmised that he suffered from extrapulmonary tuberculosis . On 13 April his chief physician informed him that his illness would be fatal. He died in Paris on 14 May 1643, the 33rd anniversary of his father's death. According to his biographer A. Lloyd Moote, "his intestines were inflamed and ulcerated, making digestion virtually impossible; tuberculosis had spread to his lungs, accompanied by habitual cough. Either of these major ailments, or

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