Tea at Trianon: The Renovations at Versailles

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, April 28, 2022

The Renovations at Versailles

From Lonely Planet:

Today the hall is welcoming guided tours again after eight months of closure, bringing back motifs that had disappeared after a previous restoration in 1789 and restoring the mammoth Luc-Olivier Merson painting, The Tennis Court Oath.

Elsewhere in the palace, the apartment of the Dauphin – Louis XV᾽s eldest son – is reopening today too after 18 months of work. Considered one of the most prestigious apartments in the palace, the ground floor apartment (made up of a bedroom, library and reception room) rejoins the tour circuit alongside the restored private quarters of Madame Du Barry (Louis XV's mistress).

Museum officials have tried to make the rooms look almost exactly as they did when they were at the height of their power and pomp, hiring local carpenters, gilders, marble and stucco workers to bring back their 18th-century shine. (Read more.)