Tea at Trianon: Sèvres Vases of Madame Victoire

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Sèvres Vases of Madame Victoire

Now in the newly renovated suite of Mesdames at Versailles, the Sèvres porcelain vases belonged to Madame Victoire. (Via Louis XX.) To quote:

In 1772, Madame Victoire, one of the daughters of Louis XV, acquired these three vases for her bedroom in the Palace of Versailles. Madame Victoire in fact ordered a matching set of five vases with a green background from the Royal Porcelain Manufactory of Sèvres. The other two vases of the set are now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

These three vases are exceptional for their painted scenes and their shape. The cartouches are the work of Charles-Nicolas Dodin, one of the finest painters of figures in the Manufactory in the 18th century, to whom the Palace of Versailles dedicated an exhibition in 2012. Their unique shape had not yet been represented in the national collections. The central “beaded” vase has a cartouche based on a painting executed in 1737 for Louis XV, The Charms of Country Life. The scenes painted on the other two “laurel leaf” vases are The Lovers Surprised, based on an engraving by Gilles Demarteau, and Spring, inspired by one of the canvases of the Seasons painted in 1755 for Madame de Pompadour.

These vases have now been returned to their original place on the mantelpiece of Madame Victoire’s bedroom. (Read more.)

lara77 said...: They are absolutely magnificent! Can you imagine what Versailles would look like if the republic had not sold off so many royal treasures during the revolution? You can see so many of them on the mantlepieces of Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle. British wisdom; French stupidity.; May 15, 2013 at 9:08:00 AM EDT