Tea at Trianon: A Roman Fresco in London

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

Friday, February 12, 2016

A Roman Fresco in London

From Smithsonian:

The fresco was discovered at 21 Lime Street in the heart of London’s insurance district while a team from the Museum of London Archeology was doing fieldwork for a new office building. Thousands of years ago, the site was home to a different building, London’s Roman Basilica and Forum, a towering structure larger than St. Paul’s Cathedral, which served as a kind of city center and shopping mall for Londoners.

The discovery of the face-down fresco hints at the way the forum and adjacent buildings were torn down. Apparently, this building was simply toppled to the ground, instead of being demolished in a more thorough manner, meaning that after the wall fell to the ground, it was simply built over. All the better for archaeologists: When they uncovered the eight-foot long and nearly five-foot high wall section, they were able to flip it over to see the ornate decoration they believe used to stand in a rich family’s reception room. (Read more.)