Tea at Trianon: The Marianne Trilogy

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

Sunday, January 28, 2018

The Marianne Trilogy

From Coin Update:

The Monnaie de Paris have launched (19th January) the second set of coins which is part of their very popular Marianne Trilogy series that focuses on one of the country’s most enduring symbols of nationhood and the French Republic: Marianne. Following the series of collector coins featuring the Sower, Hercules, and the Rooster, the Monnaie de Paris honours a major symbol of the French Republic for the second year.

Since the earliest days of the French Republic in 1792, Marianne was envisaged to become a personification of liberty and reason — the ideals and aspirations of the new society which emerged out of the French Revolution. The revolution saw an end to France’s millennium-old Ancien Régime (the old order) with the execution of King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette, and what emerged from the ruins of the now-defunct French monarchy was an allegorical portrayal of the Goddess of Liberty. This female representation soon became a symbol of Republican France, with an effigy of Lady Liberty soon gracing the obverse side of new coins of the republic, replacing that of the king’s likeness. Typically Marianne is depicted wearing a Phrygian cap, a soft felt cone-shaped hat, the depiction of which has evolved over the years, more influenced by artistic and period-era style.

Although the origins of Marianne regarding how or when she received her name remains unclear, she has continued as a reminder and an evolving attachment of the common citizen to the revolution which founded the French Republic. During the reign of Napoleon, the restored kingdom in 1816, and the Second Empire from 1852 until 1870, Marianne had been replaced with symbols representing Napoleon I, King Louis XVIII, Charles I, Louis Philippe, and Napoleon III — including the likenesses of each monarch. From the Third Republic to the present, the likeness of Marianne was restored on state issuances such as coins, stamps, and bank notes. (Read more.)