Tea at Trianon: Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette and the Dauphin Louis-Charles

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

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette and the Dauphin Louis-Charles

Conjugem sequerer meum, Nisi hic teneret.~ Seneca's Troades

According to the Waddesdon Rothschild Collection:

In the medallion, Marie-Antoinette is placed on the left, Louis XVI on the right and Louis-Charles between them in the front. Marie-Antoinette has a tall hairstyle decorated with feathers and flowers. She wears an ermine cape decorated with fleur-de-lis. Louis XVI wears a lace collar and an ermine cape also decorated with fleur-de-lis. Louis-Charles wears an open collar and a sash.....

The print quotes from Seneca's Troades, a passage where Andromache states that she'd follow her husband (Hektor) into death if her son (Astyanax) did not bind her to life. Using a classical tragedy in this context serves to highlight the tragedy of the royal family. The interpretation could change depending on whether this was created before or after Louis-Charles' death on 8 June 1795. Paul thinks it is more likely to date after Louis-Charles' death. (Read more.)