Photos of the trip
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| A few of Jason's pics | Toni's take on things |
A Brief Summary of French History, 4th - 20th century
(Some of the pictures can be clicked for enlargements)[The Capetians] [Rise of Gothic] [The Valois] [The Louvre] [The Bourbons]
[The Enlightenment] [The Revolution] [The 19th Century] [The 20th Century]
Once upon a time, some people called the Parisii lived on a small island in the river Seine. The rest is history...
The history of the city of Paris goes back to pre-historic
times.
Traces of habitation in the
Paris basin have been found from the fourth and second millennia BC. Within
the city itself, neolithic canoes, evidence of early river traffic, were
discovered
in
the
early 1990s. Bronze Age tombs and artefacts have also been discovered at various
archaeological sites, many of which continue to be dug amidst the hectic life
of the modern city.
250BC: Celtic Parisii
The first stable society appears to have developed around 250BC, when a Celtic
tribe called the Parisii established a fishing settlement on the Ile de la Cité,
which became the heart of the ancient and medieval city of Paris.
Sited on a route between Germany and Spain at the confluence of the Seine
and
Marne rivers, it was a natural crossroads. The Celts were excellent traders,
and
grew prosperous -some enormous hoards of gold coins
from
the
first
century
BC can be seen today at the Musée des Antiquités Nationales in St-Germain-en-Laye,
just west of the current city limits. To this day, the image of a trading ship
is the official symbol of the city of Paris and can be seen all over the city.
Roman
conquest
Its strategic position and prosperous population made
the
city
a
prime target. By the first century BC the Romans arrived in northern Gaul and
set their sights on an invasion of the city.
Julius
Caesar
mentions Paris (which the Romans
called
Lutétia),
in
his book "Gallic Wars". In 53BC, some of the Celtic tribes , the Senones and
the
Carnutes, refused to send delegates to the Roman Assembly of Gaul, and the following
year,
a Celt
named Vercingétorix spearheaded a revolt against the Romans and took
control of Lutétia, arming the city against a now certain war against Caesar.
In a brief battle
by the Champ de Mars (where the Eiffel tower now stands), the Celtic army was
massacred,
and
Vercingétorix
captured; thereafter the Parisii tribe and Gaul were firmly under Roman
rule.
Lutétia thrived. The Roman town centred on what is now the Left Bank. Many
fabulous villas were built on the banks of the Seine, along with an enormous
forum, at least one amphitheatre, and a magnificent bath complex, all decorated
with frescoes and mosaics. These were built in the period 50-200AD.
There
was also a temple to Jupiter, where Notre Dame cathedral now stands.
Christianity & St-Denis
Christianity appeared in the third century AD, when St-Denis,
first bishop of Lutétia, was sent to evangelise its people. Legend has it
that in 260, he and two companions began to knock pagan statues off their
pedestals.
They were arrested and decapitated on Mount Mercury, thereafter known as
Mons Martis (Mount of Martyrs), later Montmartre. Plucky Denis picked up
his head and
walked away, chanting psalms. He finally stopped north of Paris, where a
pious Christian woman buried him. A sanctuary was later erected on the spot,
since
replaced by the St-Denis basilica. As Roman power weakened, Lutétia (renamed
Paris in 212) was under increasing attack from barbarians from the east.
Many
inhabitants retreated to their ancestral island, and a wall was built around
the Cité. In 313 Emperor Constantine effectively made Christianity the new
religion of the Empire.
357-363: Emperor Julian
In 357, a new governor,
Constantine’s nephew Julian, arrived. He improved the city’s defences, and
sought to return to Platonic ideals in opposition to what he saw as the
brutality of Constantine and subsequent Christian emperors. In 361, after
victories over the barbarians, his army declared him Roman Emperor in Paris.
Condemned by Christian historians as ‘Julian the Apostate’, he could do little
to turn back the new faith or the decline of Rome; he was killed in battle
in
363.
Ste-Geneviève & Attila the Hun
By the early fifth century, Roman rule
had effectively collapsed in northern Gaul. In the ensuing chaos, the exemplary
life of Ste-Geneviève — and the threat of war — helped confirm many converts in
the new faith. As the legend goes, in 451 Attila the Hun and his army were
approaching Paris. Its people prepared to flee, but Geneviève told them to stay,
saying the Hun would spare their city so long as they repented of their sins and
prayed with her. Miraculously, Attila moved off to the south, since the vestiges
of the Roman army had retreated south to Orleans. However, the Parisians became
convinced that Geneviève had saved them and she was acclaimed saviour of
Paris.
Clovis & the Merovingians
The reprieve was temporary. In 464
Childéric the Frank attacked Paris, and in 508 his son Clovis made it his
capital, seated at the old Roman governor’s palace on the Ile de la Cité. The
now-aged Geneviève converted the new king to Christianity; he was baptised by St
Rémi in Reims, 496. Clovis (ruled 481-511) began the Merovingian dynasty, of
‘Long-haired kings’ (they never cut their hair, apparently). On the Left Bank he
founded the abbey of St-Pierre et St-Paul (later Ste-Geneviève), where he, queen
Clotilde and Geneviève could be buried side by side. The Tour de Clovis, within
the Lycée Henri IV, is a last relic of the basilica. Ste Geneviève, who died
about 512, remains the patron saint of Paris; a shrine to her and relics are in
the church of St-Etienne-du-Mont (originally adjoining the abbey). Clovis’ son
and successor Childéric II founded the equally renowned abbey of St-Germain des
Prés. Not that the Merovingians were especially pious: under their law an
inheritance had to be divided equally among heirs, which led to regular
bloodletting and infanticide and the eventual snuffing-out of the line in
751.
Carolingians vs. Vikings
Next came the Carolingians, named
after Charles Martel (‘the Hammer’), credited with halting the spread of Islam
after defeating the Moors at Tours in 732. In 751 his son Pepin ‘the Short’ was
proclaimed King of all the Franks. His heir Charlemagne extended the Frankish
kingdom and was made Holy Roman Emperor by the Pope in 800. He chose
Aix-La-Chapelle (Aachen) as his capital.
After Charlemagne, the Carolingian
empire gradually fell apart, helped by famine, flood and marauding Vikings the
Norsemen or Normans), who sacked the city repeatedly between 845 and 885.
When Emperor Charles II the Bald showed little interest in defending the city,
Parisians sought help from Robert the Strong, Count of Anjou. His son Eudes
(Odo), succeeded him as Count of Paris, and led the defence of the city in a
ten-month-long Viking seige in 885. The feudal lords thus came to outpower their
masters. In 987, the Count of Paris, Hugues Capet, great-grandson of Robert the
Strong, was elected King of France and made Paris his capital. A new era had
begun.
An eyewitness account of the Viking invasions
Source: Bouquet, "Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France", Vol. VIII, pp. 4-26.
The Northmen came to Paris with 700 sailing ships, not counting those of smaller size which are commonly called barques. At one stretch the Seine [river] was lined with the vessels for more than two leagues, so that one might ask in astonishment in what cavern the river had been swallowed up, since it was not to be seen.The second day after the fleet of the Northmen arrived under the walls of the city, Siegfried, who was then king [of the Vikings] only in name but who was in command of the expedition, came to the dwelling of the illustrious bishop [Gauzelin]. He bowed his head and said: "Gauzelin, have compassion on yourself and on your flock. We beseech you to listen to us, in order that you may escape death. Allow us only the freedom of the city. We will do no harm and we will see to it that whatever belongs either to you or to Odo shall be strictly respected."
Count Odo, who later became king, was then the defender of the city. The bishop replied to Siegfried, "Paris has been entrusted to us [the bishop--he uses the "royal we" here] by the Emperor Charles, who, after God, king and lord of the powerful, rules over almost all the world. He has put it in our care, not at all that the kingdom may be ruined by our misconduct, but that he may keep it and be assured of its peace. If, like us, you had been given the duty of defending these walls, and if you should have done that which you ask us to do, what treatment do you think you would deserve?"
Siegfried replied. "I should deserve that my head be cut off and thrown to the dogs. Nevertheless, if you do not listen to my demand, on the morrow our war machines will destroy you with poisoned arrows. You will be the prey of famine and of pestilence and these evils will renew themselves perpetually every year." So saying, he departed and gathered together his comrades.
In the morning the Northmen, boarding their ships, approached the tower
and attacked it [the tower blocked access to the city by the so-called "Great
Bridge," which connected the right bank of the Seine with the island on which
the city was built. The tower stood on the present site of the Châtelet]. They
shook it with their engines and stormed it with arrows. The city resounded with
clamor, the people were aroused, the bridges trembled. All came together to defend the tower. There Odo, his brother Robert, and the Count Ragenar distinguished themselves for bravery; likewise the courageous Abbot Ebolus, the nephew of the bishop. A keen arrow wounded the prelate, while at his side the young warrior Frederick was struck by a sword. Frederick died, but the old man, thanks to God, survived. There perished many Franks; after receiving wounds they were lavish of life. At last the enemy withdrew, carrying off their dead.
The evening came. The tower had been sorely tried, but its foundations were still solid, as were also the narrow bays which surmounted them. The people spent the night repairing it with boards. By the next day, on the old citadel had been erected a new tower of wood, a half higher than the former one. At sunrise the Danes caught their first glimpse of it. Once more the latter engaged with the Christians in violent combat. On every side arrows sped and blood flowed. With the arrows mingled the stones hurled by slings and war-machines; the air was filled with them.
The tower which had been built during the night groaned under the strokes of the darts, the city shook with the struggle, the people ran hither and thither, the bells jangled. The warriors rushed together to defend the tottering tower and to repel the fierce assault. Among these warriors two, a count and an abbot [Ebolus], surpassed all the rest in courage. The former was the redoubtable Odo who never experienced defeat and who continually revived the spirits of the worn-out defenders. He ran along the ramparts and hurled back the enemy. On those who were secreting themselves so as to undermine the tower he poured oil, wax, and pitch, which, being mixed and heated, burned the Danes and tore off their scalps. Some of them died; others threw themselves into the river to escape the awful substance. . . .
Meanwhile Paris was suffering not only from the sword outside but also from a pestilence within which brought death to many noble men. Within the walls there was not ground in which to bury the dead. . . . Odo, the future king, was sent to Charles [the Fat], emperor of the Franks, to implore help for the stricken city. One day Odo suddenly appeared in splendor in the midst of three bands of warriors. The sun made his armor glisten and greeted him before it illuminated the country around. The Parisians saw their beloved chief at a distance, but the enemy, hoping to prevent his gaining entrance to the tower, crossed the Seine and took up their position on the bank. Nevertheless Odo, his horse at a gallop, got past the Northmen and reached the tower, whose gates Ebolus opened to him. The enemy pursued fiercely the comrades of the count who were trying to keep up with him and get refuge in the tower.
[The Danes were defeated in the attack.]
Now came the Emperor Charles, surrounded by soldiers of all nations, even as the sky is adorned with resplendent stars. A great throng, speaking many languages, accompanied him. He established his camp at the foot of the heights of Montmartre, near the tower. He allowed the Northmen to have the country of Sens to plunder; and in the spring he gave them 700 pounds of silver on condition that by the month of March they leave France for their own kingdom. Then Charles returned, destined to an early death.
The capetians
The ascension of Hugues Capet, founder of the Capetian
dynasty, is the point from which ‘France’ can be said to exist. For a long
time,
however, the kingdom consisted of little more than the Ile-de-France. Powerful
local lords would defy royal authority for centuries. ‘France’ would largely
be
created through the gradual extension of Parisian power.Paris continued to grow in importance, thanks to its powerful abbeys and the fairs of St-Germain and St-Denis. By the 12th century, three distinct areas were in place: religion and government on Ile de la Cité, intellectual life around the Left Bank schools, and commerce and finance on the Right Bank.
Abbot Suger and his Administration
Suger was born in 1081 of a very minor knightly family He was dedicated to the abbey of St. Denis at the age of nine or ten and came to see himself as its adopted child. Appointed abbot in 1122, he held that position until his death in 1155.His office was a highly prestigious one. The abbey had been founded in the seventh century by the Frankish king Dagobert in honor of Denis, the patron saint of France, and his legendary companions Rusticus and Eleutherius. By Suger's time it had long been the royal abbey of France. Kings were educated and buried there.
In Suger's time, the French monarchy was slowly but surely on the way up. The king
was gradually gaining power over his unruly nobles and would eventually use that power to win a major role in European affairs. Most of that development was still in the future, but by 1137 the
pendulum was already beginning to swing. As royal abbey, St. Denis was a symbol
of royal power - thus its renovation was a political as well as an
architectural and religious event.Suger's status as abbot made him one of the most powerful men in France. He was actively engaged in French political life and virtually ran the kingdom while King Louis VII was away on crusade. A fervent patriot, Suger never hesitated to identify the best interests of king, France, Church, abbey and God.
The old abbey church of St. Denis had been completed in 775. By 1137 it was dilapidated and dangerous. Suger decided improvement was in order and in that year he began work on the west end of the church, building a new facade with two towers and three doors. In 1140 he moved from the west end clear to the other end of the church and started to build a new choir. It was completed in 1144. The result was a major event in the history of architecture. Gothic was born.
The influence of the abbey church on French architecture was undoubtedly furthered by its role as political symbol.When the new choir was consecrated in 1144, five French archbishops and thirteen bishops took part in the ceremony, an impressive tribute to Suger, his king, and the founding saint of the French nation - Denis.
However wonderful Denis' legend may seem, medieval historians made it even better by confusing him with two other figures of the same name. "Denis" is the French version of the Latin "Dionysius," the name Suger actually used. We encounter another Dionysius in Acts 17:34, converted during Paul's brief missionary visit to Athens. Five centuries later, in the late fifth or early sixth century, an anonymous Syrian theologian fascinated by the religious symbolism of light wrote a series of treatises which were attributed to the Dionysius of Acts 17:34. Eventually all the elements were combined and, according the legend, Dionysius was converted by Paul, became bishop of Athens, wrote the treatises, and eventually missionized France where he was martyred.
The identification is more important than one might at first imagine. The figure of St. Denis united the various aspects of the church in a peculiar way. As patron saint of France, his interests were tied to those of France in a twofold sense. His glorification was hers in a very direct way because he symbolized France. It was also hers more indirectly because, lake other saints, Denis would not neglect to reward a favor, and thus one could expect him to intervene for king and country more enthusiastically if his church was generously endowed.
Denis also united the religious and architectural aspects of the new church. It is hardly a coincidence that both the pseudo-Dionysian treatises and nascent Gothic architecture are interested in light. As we shall see, Suger himself was fascinated by the religious implications of light and built accordingly.
The rise of "Gothic"
We should take a detour from the historical narrative to describe some important developments in architecture. Most Carolingian buildings, even the palaces of Charlemagne, were made of wood. Though not unknown, glass was rare. Brick-making was practically unknown. Frescoes decorated the greater churches and monasteries.The ninth and tenth centuries were generally a period of destruction rather than construction. New barbarian invasions and the civil and feudal wars were ruinous to all wooden buildings. The same held true for all churches built with wooden roofs. With the cessation of the invasions, the relative settling down of feudal chaos, and the growing monastic reforms associated with the rise of the Cluniac monastic order, forces were set in motion making possible the first real architectural revival in the west in the eleventh century.
To a French monk writing at this time the large amount of new building in stone made it seem "as though the world were throwing off its decrepitude to clothe itself anew in an array of white sanctuaries." It was to be a new age of stone. Building became an exciting passion. The amount of building increased as the century grew older. And when the new stimuli of reforms and crusades, and above all of the town boom were added, it went on even more rapidly in the early 12th century until it culminated in the Gothic furor.
A Norman abbot wrote in 1115:
"Who has ever seen or heard the like? Princes, powerful and wealthy men, men of noble birth, proud and beautiful women, bent their necks to the yoke of the carts which carried stones, wood, wine, corn, oil, lime, everything necessary for the church and the support of those working at it. One saw as many as a thousand people, men and women, attacked to the reins drawing a wagon so heavy was its burden and a profound silence reigned among the crowd pressing forward with difficulty in the emotion which filled their hearts."
It was, roughly speaking, during the century and a half following 1000 that the characteristic feature of what we call the Romanesque style were evolved. Yet it is difficult to be accurate in defining the particular features that distinguish Romanesque from earlier and later styles. The use of the round arch was borrowed from the Romans, an historical allusion that still conferred an aura of permanence. There were many schools of Romanesque: the Lombard school, the Rhenish school, the Norman school, etc. With the rise of travel in this period, some unity was given to these various schools by traveling workmen and conquests.
Romanesque churches were generally low and poorly lighted, with emphatic horizontality. They preserved and improved upon the modifications of the Carolingian basilican ground plan. The church became larger, and the approach to the altar from the nave more impressive. The original rectangular basilica became a Latin cross in form. The nave was for the congregation with its ground plan left open for the vista and for processions. Romanesque interiors were sometimes richly decorated with frescoes and mosaics.
Better times, increased wealth, and heightened religious emotion in general demanded bigger and better churches. The Romans had built three kinds of stone vaults: the dome, the barrel vault, and the groined vault. During the early middle ages it appears that knowledge of how to build these stone vaults was lost in the west. But during the Romanesque period, they were rediscovered.
In the groined vault in particular, the continuous thrust of the barrel vault is broken into individual thrusts which are concentrated along the lines of the intersections or groins of the vault, and brought down to a definite point at the four corners of the vault. As a result, there are two points of thrust, the haunch and springing point of the arch, but they are isolated along the lines of intersection of the two barrel vaults which go to make up the groined vault.
If some external support to the walls of the nave or side aisles could be applied at those points where, in a groined vault, the thrust is concentrated, then the function of the walls would be limited to supporting the weight of the vault, rather than both supporting the weight and containing the thrust. They could accordingly be made lighter, and could less dangerously be opened up with windows.
Thus, from the point of view of a well-lighted interior, groined vaults were superior to barrel vaults. All this knowledge was learned by the Romanesque architects only after costly and sometimes disastrous experiments with actual buildings.
Stone vaults were first of all thrown over the narrower spaces of the side aisles. Skill and knowledge had to be acquired before the builders dared put them over the wider areas of nave and transepts. The building of a groined vault necessitates the division of the area to be vaulted into squares called bays, for obviously the intersection of two barrel vaults of equal height can only cover a square.
For both barrel vaulting and groined vaulting, builders found it advantageous to mark the limits of the bay by spanning the area to be vaulted with arches of masonry, called ribs, that could be used as partial supports of the vaults themselves. The framework of transverse, diagonal, and longitudinal ribs formed a kind of permanent centering and acted as a partial support for the weight of the vault carrying and concentrating the thrusts of the vault to one specific spot on the nave wall. Each particular rib is carried to the floor as a distinct part of a clustered pier.
But the problem of light was not yet settled, because the builders did not dare to raise the very heavy vault of the nave so high as to admit a clerestory. Light had to come in, therefore, only from the windows of the triforium gallery and of the side aisles. Without a clerestory the concentrated thrust of the nave vaulting could be met by the vaults of the triforium gallery, which carried them to the strong pilaster buttresses built on the outside walls of the side aisles and triforium, at those points where the thrusts of their own vaults were concentrated by ribbing. So, by the use of buttresses, piers, and ribbing the problem of supporting the stone vault had been solved. But this still did not bring in enough light. (this will all be a lot easier to understand when we're standing in front of the real thing!)
Twelfth century architects solved the problem of light. They not only introduced an extra transverse rib between the diagonal ribs of the nave vault, but they raised the vaulting of the nave high enough above the triforium gallery to permit a clerestory. The structure of cathedrals became ever more skeletal, soaring to new heights (Amiens in 144 feet from floor to vault keystone), and allowing enormous space for stained glass. The clerestory became in effect one continuous sheet of colored glass interrupted only by ribs running down from the vaults to the floor. When a gabled roof was substituted for a lean-to roof over the side aisles, the triforium could be transformed into glass. In total effect, therefore, the Gothic church is a soaring glass house held together by a skeletal framework of stone, or a vast "vaulted glass cage."
From the Capetians to the Valois
Back to history... In 1215 the Paris schools combined in a more formally organised 'university' under papal protection. Most famous was the Sorbonne, founded in 1253 by Robert de Sorbon, Louis IX's chaplain. The greatest medieval thinkers attended this 'New Athens': German theologian Albert the Great, Italians Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, and the Englishman William of Ockham.
Philip AugustusThe first great Capetian monarch Philippe II (Philippe Auguste 1165-1223) became king in 1180. He won Normandy from King John of England and added Auvergne and Champagne. The first great royal builder to leave a mark on Paris, he built a new, larger fortified city wall, chunks of which can still be seen in rue des Jardins-St-Paul in the Marais and rue Clovis in the Latin Quarter. He began a new fortress on the Right Bank, the Louvre, but his main residence was on Ile de la Cité. He also carried out much needed modernization of the city, establishing the first covered markets, Les Halles, in 1181.
Louis IX (St Louis)
Philippe's grandson Louis IX (1226-70) was famed for his extreme piety. When not on crusade, he put his stamp on Paris, commissioning the Sainte Chapelle, convents, hospices and student hostels. But it was his grandson, Philippe IV (Le Bel, 1285-1314) who transformed the fortress on the Cité into a palace fit for a king, with the monumental Salle des Gens d'Armes in the Conciergerie. The end of his reign, however, was marred by insurrection and riotous debauchery. In suspiciously quick succession, his three sons ascended the throne. The last, Charles IV, died in 1328, leaving no male heir.
The Valois Kings
The power vacuum proved irresistible to the English, who claimed the French crown for young Edward III, son of Philippe IV's daughter. The French refused to recognise his claim because it had been inherited via the female line. Philippe de Valois, the late king's cousin, claimed the crown for himself (1328-50), and thus began the Hundred Years' War.
1420-36: English RuleAfter the battle of Agincourt in 1415 (remember the movie "Henry V"?), the English, in alliance with Jean, Duke of Burgundy, seemed to prevail. From 1420-36 Paris (and most of France) was under English rule, with the Duke of Bedford as governor. In 1431, Henry VI of England was crowned in Notre Dame. But the city was almost constantly besieged by the French, at one time famously helped by Joan of Arc (remember the movie "The Messenger"?). Eventually, the dauphin Charles VII (1422-61) retook his capital.
Renaissance
In the last decades of the 15th century the restored Valois monarchs sought to reassert their position. Masons erected Flamboyant Gothic churches, as well as impressive mansions commissioned by nobles, prelates and wealthy bourgeois, such as Hôtel de Cluny and Hôtel de Sens. The city's population tripled over the 16th century. The most spectacular Valois was François 1er (1515-47),
epitome of a Renaissance monarch. He engaged in endless wars with great rival Emperor Charles V, but also built sumptuous châteaux at Fontainebleau, Blois and Chambord, and gathered a glittering court of knights, poets and Italian artists, such as Leonardo da Vinci and Benvenuto Cellini. He also set about transforming the Louvre into the palace we see today.François 1er, however, was unable to prevent the advance of Protestantism, even if ever more heretics were sent to the stake. Huguenot (French Protestant) strongholds were mostly in the west; Paris, by contrast, was a citadel of virulent, often bloodthirsty Catholic orthodoxy, complicated by interwoven aristocratic squabbles between the factions of the Huguenot Prince de Condé and the Catholic Duc de Guise, supported by Henri II (1547-60).
The Wars of Religion
Henry died in 1559 and chaos followed. He was succeeded by Francis II and then Charles IX. In 1572, Catherine de Medici married her daughter Marguerite de Valois to a young leader of the Huguenots, Henry, king of Navarre. On the eve of Saint Bartholomew's Day (Aug.22nd) of that year, Catherine ordered a horrible massacre of the Huguenots (Protestants). For five days, Henry of Navarre was held prisoner in the Louvre and his supporters were rounded up and massacred.
Pope Gregory XIII
and the Catholic allies of Europe openly congratulated Catherine for ordering
the slaughter - its timing was apparently precipitated by the growing sympathy
that the sickly Charles IX felt for the Protestants. Estimates of the number
dead in Paris and throughout France reach as high as fifty thousand, but as we
know all too well today, bloodshed did not eliminate the problem. The Wars of
Religion continued for another 25 years. Henry
of Navarre became French King in 1589 and began the thankless task of
re-unifying Catholics and Protestants. His second wife Marie de Medici brought
him the political clout in the Catholic world to exert huge influence in the
first decade of the 17th century.Confused? Check out this chart of the French Monarchy: http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/Rulers/bourbon.html
The Louvre
It seems appropriate to pause here and look at the complicated history of the Louvre. It is known today as the greatest museum in the world, but over the centuries, it has undergone many changes. The most important date in its history is 1793, when it was opened as a Museum of the Republic (this happens to have been the same year that King Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette were executed by the radical revolutionary government). But the Royal Family had already moved out in 1682, so the Louvre was an obvious choice as a location for the "museum", which was, of course, an entirely new concept at this time.
There is no national museum in the world as incredibly
situated. With 19 heactares of rooms, 3 and 4 stories high, the building
houses millions of art works. Even today, this mighty ship of culture
continues to be the subject of controversy. In the 1980's, many of France's
cultural elite staged protests and boycotts in futile attempts to prevent the
construction of Ioh Ming Pei's spectacular glass
pyramid in the centre of the museum's forecourt. The Socialist President
Francois Mitterand won the day, though, and the museum is now able to
accommodate nearly twice as many
visitors per day as it could before 1993, thanks to Pei's
brilliant design.
The name "Louvre" probably only means "wolf", suggesting that a wolf-infested forest once stood there. It was established at the western end of the city limits around 1100. The square court is the oldest part of the structure. Originally, a one hundred foot (31 m) high tower on the southwest corner built by Phillip Augustus in the early 1200's dominated the Parisian skyline. It can be seen in a famous illumination for the month of October in "Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry", a manuscript produced by the Limbourg brothers between 1416-19. The illumination shows us a moated castle (one of the architectural wonders of the age), which offered the king protection from foreign enemies to the west and unruly Parisians to the east. It became the model for military defenses throughout the kingdom, and the subject of ballads and popular tales. However, Phillip didn't use this palace very much and mainly resided at the palace of the Cité.
The history of the Louvre isn't very exciting until the time of King Francis I, (described above) who came to the throne in 1515, at the
age of 21. He was known across Europe as an overtly confident and powerful king,
as can be seen in his portrait
painted by Jean Clouet about 1520 (one of the works we'll be spending time with in the grand gallery). Francis was a connoisseur and amateur of art.
He collected works by all the great Italian masters of the day, primarily
Leonardo da Vinci. The portrait by Clouet reveals the exquisite and sumptuous
tastes of the king: the brocade background, the pearls and feathers in his hat,
the satin doublet with gold embroidery and the incredibly detailed sword in his
hand. Moreover, his narrow eyes, shrewd look and thin moustache seem to portray
a man of great intelligence and cunning. The next architectural phase of the Louvre began with preparations for the visit of Charles V to Paris in 1540. Francis hired Pierre Lescot, his favourite architect, who continued to work during the reign of Henry II. The decoration was entrusted to Jean Goujon, a sculptor who had studied with Michelangelo. The work of Lescot and Goujon can be seen in the square court, on the east-facing wall of the west wing of the court. In keeping with Mannerist stylistic tendencies, there is an over-abundance of sculptural decoration on the top storey of Lescot's exterior walls. Mannerist artists and architects liked to turn common-sense on its head and deliberately did the opposite of what would have been considered good taste to the previous generation. There is a kind of excess of style (or over-stylization) present here. We'll talk a lot about Mannerism on site.
Henry II, the next king to influence the development of the Louvre, was married to Catherine de Medici (described above). She had the Tuileries palace built, which was an enormous wing that ran north-south at the far western end of the site. Henry began to rebuild the Louvre on a huge scale, expanding the square court, and creating the quadrangles to the west. also created the Grande Galerie that runs east-west along the Seine. Considering its turbulent history, it is no wonder the 18th century artist Hubert Robert painted two very different depictions of the Grand Gallery. The first is a delightful view of a thriving place of artisitc enjoyment and study...the other is Robert's imaginary depiction of how the Louvre will look one day as a ruin. Just as it is certain that great art will endure, it is equally certain that civilizations will eventually destroy themselves.
The Bourbons
Louis XIII & Cardinal RichelieuOn Henri IV's death, his son Louis XIII (1610-43) was only eight years old, and Henri's widow, Marie de Médicis, became regent. She commissioned the Palais du Luxembourg and a series of 24 panels glorifying her role painted by Rubens (now in the Louvre). In 1617 Louis was encouraged to take over. But Cardinal Richelieu, chief minister from 1624, held the real power.
Richelieu won the confidence of tormented Louis, who stuck by his minister through numerous plots hatched by his mother, wife Anne of Austria, assorted princes and disgruntled grandees. A brilliant administrator, Richelieu created a strong, centralised monarchy, paving the way for the absolutism of Louis XIV and grinding down what he perceived as the two major enemies of the monarchy: Spain, and the independence of the aristocracy (especially the Huguenots). A great architectural patron, he commissioned Jacques Lemercier to build him what was to became the Palais-Royal, and rebuilt the Sorbonne. This was the height of the Catholic Counter-Reformation, and architects were commissioned to create such lavish baroque churches as the Val-de-Grâce.
The literary lights of the Grand Siècle often found their patrons in the elegant Marais hôtels particuliers, where salons hosted by lettered ladies like Mlle de Scudéry, Mme de la Fayette, Mme de Sévigné and the erudite courtesan Ninon de l'Enclos, rang with witty asides and political intrigue. By comparison, Richelieu's Académie Française (founded 1634) was a fusty, pedantic reflection of the establishment.
A nice website with some really handy summaries of French historical and cultural periods, with illustrations:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bnf/
Cardinal Mazarin & La FrondeRichelieu died in 1642. The next year Louis XIII died, leaving five-year-old Louis XIV as heir. Anne of Austria became regent, with Cardinal Mazarin (a Richelieu protégé whose palace is part of the Bibliothèque Nationale Richelieu) as chief minister.
In 1648 the royal family was made to flee Paris by the Fronde, a rebellion of peasants and aristocrats led by the Prince de Condé against taxes and growing royal power. Parisians soon tired of anarchy. When Mazarin's army entered Paris in 1653 with the boy-king, they were warmly received. Mazarin died in 1661, shortly after Spain had been decisively defeated, leaving France stronger than ever, with military capasity to spare.
Louis XIV, the Sun King
This was the springboard for Louis XIV's absolute rule, with the classically megalomaniac statement 'L'Etat, c'est moi' (I am the state). Louis XIV's greatness demanded military expansion and France waged continual wars against the Dutch, Austria and England. An essential figure in Louis' years of triumph was minister of finance Jean-Baptiste Colbert. He amassed most of the other important ministries over the 1660s and determined to transform Paris into a 'new Rome', with grand, symmetrical vistas - a sort of expression of absolute monarchy in stone. In the 1680s, he commissioned the finely proportioned place des Victoires and place Vendôme and opened up the first boulevards along the line of Charles V's wall, with triumphal arches at Porte St-Denis and Porte St-Martin. Louis XIV took little interest in the schemes. Such was his aversion to Paris that from the 1670s he transferred his court to Versailles.
The arts flourished. In 1659 Molière's troupe of actors settled in Paris under the protection of the King, presenting plays for court and public. Favoured composer at Versailles was the Italian Lully, granted sole right to compose operas (in which the king often appeared). Rameau and Charpentier also composed, while the tragedies of Racine were encouraged.Despite Colbert's efforts, endless wars left the royal finances in permanent disorder, reflected in growing poverty, vagrancy and a great many crippled war veterans. The Invalides was built to house them on one side of town, the Salpêtrière to shelter fallen women on the other. Colbert died in 1683, and the military triumphs gave way to the grim struggles of the War of the Spanish Succession. Life at Versailles soured under dour Mme de Maintenon, Louis' last mistress, whom he secretly married in 1684. Nobles began to sneak away to the modish Faubourg-St-Germain.
Website - A Day in the life of Louis XIV:
http://www.chateauversailles.fr/en/311.asp
Philippe d'Orléans
Louis XIV had several children, but both his son and grandson died before he did, leaving five-year-old great-grandson Louis XV (1715-74) as heir. The Regent, Philippe d'Orléans, an able general and diplomat, returned the Court to Paris. Installed in the Palais-Royal, his lavish dinners regularly degenerated into orgies. This degeneracy filtered down through society; Paris was the nouvelle Babylone, the modern Sodom.
AGE OF THE ENLIGHTENMENT
We can call the eighteenth century the age of the enlightenment bcause it was both a culmination and a new beginning. Fresh currents of thought were wearing down institutionalized traditions. New ideas and new approaches to old institutions were setting the stage for great revolutions to come.
I. Social Milieu
The main figures of the enlightenment are fairly well known: Rene Descartes, Blaise Pascal, the Baron de Montesquieu, Voltaire, Denis Diderot, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The pervasive appeal, as expressed by Voltaire, was to the
1. autonomy of reason
2. perfectibility and progress
3. confidence in the ability to discover causality
4. principles governing nature, man and society
5. assault on authority
6. cosmopolitan solidarity of enlightened intellectuals
7. disgust with nationalism.
Clearly the feudal edifice was crumbling, but there was no real antagonism between the bourgeoisie and the aristocracy as yet. One can detect the bourgeoisie struggling for freedom from state regulations and for liberty of commercial activity. It is also evident that a wave of prosperity brought a greater degree of self-confidence to the bourgeoisie. Great fortunes were made every town. By 1750 the reading public came into existence because of increasing literacy. Yet the philosophes lived a precarious life. They never knew whether they would be imprisoned or courted. Yet they assumed the air of an army on the march.
From the 17th century the philosophes inherited the rationalism of Descartes. Newton had discovered a fundamental cosmic law which was susceptible to mathematical proof and applicable to the minutest object as well as to the universe as a whole. John Locke had denied innate ideas and derived all knowledge, opinions and behavior from sense experience. Condillac carried this to its conclusion by insisting that even perception was transformed sensation.
So the traditional anthropocentric view of the universe lay in ruins and with it, the anthropomorphic conception of God. In all this controversy, social science was beginning emerge Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the encyclopedists invented the idea of the "noble savage" - that there is a moral sense in natural man. In his two discourses he painted a picture of depravity of society, but he came up with a new and non-theological understanding of evil. The "fall of man" was not caused by original sin, but by the inherent evil of society. Man must save himself through rediscovery of his enlightened inner nature. It is governments, laws, customs and religious institutions that are evil - not man.
It was the Enlightenment, not the Reformation or the Renaissance that dislodged the ecclesiastical establishment from central control of cultural and intellectual life. By emancipating science from the theological tradition, the Enlightenment rendered possible the autonomous evolution of modern culture. Diderot said, if you forbid me to speak on religion and government, I have nothing to say. Hence natural science occupied the front of the stage.
Most of the philosophes wrote on natural science. To Diderot, d'Holbach and the encyclopedists all religious dogma was absurd and obscure. Diderot too insisted on the free play of reason, and was himself an unashamed pagan. He believed in a kind of pantheism or pan-psychism, not pure atheism or materialism. He was humanistic, secular, modern and scientific, and he expected from his method a regeneration of mankind.
Voltaire was the most ruthless in his comic deflation of theological sophism. He conveyed the power of intellect to his generation, but also saw the limitations of reason. Reason was, after all, a poor instrument, but it was the only weapon that raised man above the animals. Voltaire accepted the classical ideal of the brotherhood of man and the universal morality of man. He was essentially a humanist--the greatest humanist of the Enlightenment.
Montesquieu published his Spirit of the Laws in 1748. He expressed deep hatred of despotism, clericalism and slavery. Being a member of the petit noblesse, he called for an "intermediary corps" and fundamental laws to temper the monarchy. His former colleague magistrates called it restitution of the ancient constitution. So, he influenced both the aristocratic reactionaries who wanted to revitalize feudal estates and parlements, and the honest liberals who idealized English constitutionalism with its principle of separation of powers, the basis of modern constitution-making. This book was the first study in ideal sociological patterns. He advocated the examination of a variety of constitutional forms to discover the republic and its inner law. A network of interacting forces, if altered, affect the equilibrium of the whole structure. He is the founder of the typology of constitutional patterns.
Rousseau rejected all compromise with contemporary society and called for a moral reformation, a revival of religion, and a purification of manners. He passionately asserted the moral and legal equality of man, the sovereignty of the people and the authority of the general will. He wanted a return to primitive simplicity. While he realized that his "state of nature" never existed, he asserted that self-knowledge was the source of his proofs. In two discourses he exposed his unlimited personal individualism. Yet in the social contract we get the glorification of unlimited absolutism of the state. Freedom for Rousseau is the submission to the law which the individual has imposed on himself. It is a voluntary consent to a necessary law. By entering this state, men gain the enlargement of their perceptions and capacities. Political and intellectual freedom is worthless for man, if he does not have moral freedom. The function of the state is to bring legal and moral equality about.
The Revolution
Louis XVIThe great failure of Louis XV's reign was the defeat in the Seven Years' War (1756-63), in which France lost most of its colonies in India and Canada to Britain. As his grandson Louis XVI (ruled 1774-91) began his reign, France was expanding economically and culturally. Across Europe, people craved Parisian luxuries. In the capital, roads were widened, lamps erected, gardens and promenades created. Parisians were obsessed with the new, from ballooning (begun by the Montgolfier brothers in 1783) to the works of Rousseau.
French intervention in the American War of Independence drove finances towards bankruptcy. In 1785, at the behest of the Fermiers généraux, a tax wall was built around Paris, which only increased popular discontent (see chapter Architecture). Louis XVI's only option was to appeal to the nation; first through the regional assemblies of lawyers and, if all else failed, the Etats-généraux, the representation of the nobility, clergy and commoners, which had not met since 1614, and which would inevitably alter the relationship between society and an absolute monarchy. In early 1789 Louis XVI continued to prevaricate.
The spring of 1789 found Louis XVI increasingly isolated as unrest swept through France. In Paris, the people were suffering the results of a disastrous harvest, and there were riots in the Faubourg-St-Antoine. The king finally agreed to convene the Etats-généraux at Versailles in May. The members of the Third Estate, the commoners, aware that they represented a far larger proportion of the population than nobility and clergy, demanded a system of one vote per member. Discussions broke down, and a rumour went round that the King was sending troops to arrest them. On 20 June 1789, at the Jeu de Paume at Versailles, the Third Estate took an oath not to separate until 'the constitution of the kingdom was established'. Louis backed down, and the Etats-généraux, newly renamed the Assemblée Nationale, set about discussing a Constitution.
Debate also raged in the streets among the poor sans-culottes (literally, 'without breeches'; only the poor wore long trousers). It was assumed that any concession by the King was intended to deceive. Louis had posted foreign troops around Paris, and on 11 July dismissed his minister, Jacques Necker, considered the commoners' sole ally. On 13 July an obscure lawyer named Camille Desmoulins leapt on a café table in the Palais-Royal. Likening Necker's dismissal to St-Bartholomew's Day, he called to the excited crowd: 'Aux armes!' ('To arms!').Storming the Bastille
On 14 July, the crowd marched on Les Invalides, carrying off thousands of guns, then moved on to the hitherto invincible Bastille, symbol of royal repression. Its governor, the Marquis de Launay, refused to surrender, but the huge crowd outside grew more aggressive. It seems that one nervous Bastille sentry fired a shot, and within minutes there was general firing on the crowd. The mob brought up cannon to storm the fortress. After a brief battle, and the deaths of 87 revolutionaries, Launay surrendered. He was immediately killed, and his head paraded through Paris on a pike. Inside were only seven prisoners. Nevertheless, the Revolution now had the symbolic act of violence that marked a break with the past. Political debate proliferated on every side, above all in the rapidly multiplying political clubs, such as the Cordeliers, who met in a Franciscan monastery in St-Germain, or the radical Jacobins, who had taken over a Dominican convent on rue St-Honoré. Thousands of pamphlets were produced, read avidly by a remarkably literate public.
But there was also real hardship among the poor. As disruption spread through the country, wheat deliveries were interrupted, raising bread prices still further. In October, an angry crowd of women marched to Versailles to protest - the incident when Marie-Antoinette supposedly said, 'let them eat cake'. The women ransacked part of the palace, killing guards, and were only placated when Louis XVI appeared with a revolutionary red-white-and-blue cockade and agreed to be taken to Paris. The royal family were now virtual prisoners in the Tuileries.
In the Assembly, the Girondins, who favoured an agreement with the monarchy, prevailed, but came under intense attack from the openly Republican Jacobins. On 20 June 1791, Louis and his family tried to escape by night, hoping to organise resistance from abroad. They got as far as the town of Varennes, where they were recognised and returned to Paris as captives.
In 1792, the monarchies of Europe formed a coalition to save Louis and his family. A Prussian army marched into France; the Duke of Brunswick threatened to raze Paris if the King came to harm. Paranoia reigned and anyone who showed sympathy for Louis could be accused of conspiring with foreign powers. On 10 August, an army of sans-culottes demanded the Assembly officially depose Louis. When they refused, the crowd attacked the Tuileries. The royal family were imprisoned in the Temple by the radical Commune de Paris, led by Danton, Marat and Robespierre.
1792-94: The TerrorThe next month, as the Prussians approached Paris, the September Massacres took place. Revolutionary mobs invaded prisons to eliminate anyone who could possibly be a 'traitor' - around 2,000 people. The monarchy was formally abolished on 22 September 1792, proclaimed Day I of 'Year I of the French Republic'. Soon after, the French citizen army defeated the Prussians at Valmy.
The most radical phase of the Revolution had begun. The Jacobins proclaimed the need to purge 'the enemies within', and Dr Guillotin's invention was installed in the place de la Révolution (formerly Louis XV, now Concorde). Louis XVI was executed on 21 January 1793; Marie-Antoinette in October. In September 1793 the Revolutionary Convention, replacing the Assemblée Nationale, took decisive action against foreign spies and put 'terror on the agenda'. Most of the leading Girondins, and even Danton and Camille Desmoulins would meet the scaffold. In the Grande Terreur of 1794, 1,300 heads fell in six weeks at place du Trône Renversé ('Overturned Throne', now place de la Nation), the bodies dumped in communal graves (see p102, Cimetière de Picpus).
Cultural transformation now proceeded apace; churches were confiscated in November 1789, made into 'temples of reason' or put to practical uses - the Sainte-Chapelle was used to store flour. All titles were abolished - monsieur and madame became citoyen and citoyenne. Artists participated in the cause: as well as painting portraits of revolutionary figures and the Death of Marat, David organised the Fête de la Régénération in August 1793 at the Bastille.
The Directoire
The Terror could not endure. In July 1794 a group of moderate Republicans led by Paul Barras succeeded in arresting Robespierre, St-Just and the last Jacobins. The former heroes were immediately guillotined. The wealthy, among them some Revolutionary nouveaux riches, emerged blinking into the city's fashionable corners. Barras and his colleagues set themselves up as a five-man Directoire to rule the Republic. In 1795, they were saved from a royalist revolt by an ambitious young Corsican general Napoléon Bonaparte, in a shootout at the Eglise St-Roch. France was still at war with most European monarchies. Bonaparte was sent to command the army in Italy, where he covered himself with glory. In 1798, he took his army to Egypt, which he almost conquered.
Emperor Napoléon.When he returned, he found a Republic in which few had any great faith, and where many were prepared to accept a dictator who had emerged from the Revolution. There had always been two potentially contradictory impulses behind the Revolution: a desire for a democratic state, but also for an effective, powerful defender of the nation. Under Napoléon, democracy was put on hold, but France was given the most powerful centralised, militaristic state ever.
In November 1799 Bonaparte staged a coup; in 1800 he was declared First Consul. Between continuing military campaigns, he set about transforming France - the education system (the Grandes Ecoles), civil law (the Code Napoléon) and administration all bear his stamp. In 1804, he crowned himself Emperor in an ostentatious ceremony in Notre Dame.
Napoléon's first additions to the city were the Canal St-Martin, quais and bridges, notably the Pont des Arts. He desired to be master of the 'most beautiful city in the world', with temples and monuments to evoke Augustan Rome - as in the Madeleine and the Bourse. The Emperor's official architects, Percier and Fontaine, also designed the rue de Rivoli.
Parisian society regained its brio. After Bonaparte's campaign, Egyptomania swept town, seen in Empire-style furniture and in architectural details in the area around rue and passage du Caire; fashionable ladies mixed Greek draperies and couture à l'égyptienne.
France seemed unstoppable. In 1805, Napoléon crushed Austria and Russia at Austerlitz. But disaster followed with his Russian invasion in 1812; Paris was occupied, for the first time since the Hundred Years' War, by the Tzar's armies in 1814. Napoléon escaped confinement in Elba to be finally defeated by Wellington at Waterloo in 1815.
Website - a summary of Napoleon's achievement:
http://mars.acnet.wnec.edu/~grempel/courses/wc2/lectures/napoleon.html
The 19th Century
Monarchy restoredIn 1814, and then again in 1815, the Bourbons were restored to the throne of France, in the shape of Louis XVI's elderly brother, who had spent the Revolution in exile, as Louis XVIII. Although his 1814 Charter of Liberties recognised that the pretensions of the ancien régime were lost forever, he and his ministers still sought to establish a repressive, Catholic regime and turn back the clock.
The capital, however, still nurtured rebellion. Paris, especially the working-class east, was far more radical than the rest of the country. Its disproportionate weight in French affairs meant it was often seen as imposing its radicalism on the nation at large. At the same time, this radicalism was fed by a progressive press, liberal intellectuals - among them artists and authors Hugo, Daumier, Delacroix and Lamartine - radical students and a growing underclass. This coalition proved explosive.
The 1830 RevolutionAnother brother of Louis XVI, Charles X, became king in 1824. On 25 July 1830 his minister Prince Polignac, in violation of the Charter of Liberties, abolished freedom of the press, dissolved the Chamber of Deputies and altered election laws. Next day, 5,000 printers and press workers were in the street. Three newspapers defiantly published. When police tried to seize copies, artisans and shopkeepers joined the riot. On 28 July, the disbanded National Guard came out rearmed, Republicans organised insurrection committees, and whole regiments of the Paris garrison defected. Three days of fighting followed, known as Les Trois Glorieuses. Charles was forced to abdicate.
1830-48: Louis-Philippe
Another leftover of the ancien régime was winched on to the throne: Louis-Philippe, Duc d'Orléans, son of Philippe-Egalité. A father of eight who never went out without his umbrella, he was eminently acceptable to the bourgeoisie. But the workers, who had spilled blood in 1830 only to see quality of life worsen, simmered throughout the 'July Monarchy'.
In the first half of the century, the population of Paris doubled to over a million, as a building boom - in part on land seized from the nobility and clergy - brought floods of provincial workers. After 1837, when France's first railway line was laid between Paris and St-Germain-en-Laye, there were stations to build too. The overflow emptied into the poorest quarters. Balzac, Hugo and Eugène Sue were endlessly fascinated by the city's underside, penning hair-raising accounts of dank, tomb-like hovels and of dismal, dangerous streets.
The well-fed, complacent bourgeoisie regarded this populace with fear. For while the Bourse, property speculation and industry flourished, workers were still forbidden from forming unions or striking. Gaslight cheered up the city streets but enabled the working day to be extended to 15 hours-plus. Factory owners pruned salaries to the limit and exploited children, unfettered by legislation. The unemployed or disabled were left to beg, steal or starve. An 1831 cholera epidemic claimed 19,000 victims, and aggravated already bitter class divisions. Louis-Philippe's préfet Rambuteau made a pitch to win Bonapartist support, finishing the Arc de Triomphe and the Madeleine, and also initiated some projects, notably the Pont Louis-Philippe and Pont du Carrousel.
1848: Revolution Again
On 23 February 1848 nervous troops fired on a crowd on boulevard des Capucines. Again, demonstrators demanded blood for blood and barricades covered the city. The Garde Nationale defected. Louis-Philippe abdicated. The workers' revolution of 1848 brought in the Second Republic, led by a progressive provisional government. Slavery in the colonies and the death penalty for political crimes were abolished and most French men (but only men) got the vote; National Workshops were set up to guarantee jobs for all. But the capital had not counted on the provinces. In May 1848 a conservative commission won the general election. It disbanded the 'make work' scheme as too costly and allied with socialism. Desperate workers took to the streets in the 'June Days'. This time the insurgents got the worst of it: thousands fell under the fire of the troops of General Cavaignac, and others were massacred in later reprisals.
Napoleon III and the Second EmpireAt the end of 1848, to widespread surprise, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, nephew of the great Emperor, won a landslide election victory. He decided he didn't merely want to preside but to reign, seizing power in a coup d'etat on 2 December 1851. In 1852, he moved into the Tuileries Palace as Emperor of France: Vive Napoléon III.
At home, Napoléon III combined authoritarianism with crowd-pleasing social welfare in true Bonapartist style. Abroad, his policies included absurd adventures such as the attempt to make Austrian Archduke Maximilian Emperor of Mexico. He had plans for Paris too: to complete the Louvre, landscape the Bois de Boulogne, construct new iron market halls at Les Halles, and open up a series of new boulevards and train stations. To carry out these tasks he appointed Baron Haussmann Préfet de la Seine from 1853. Haussmann set about his programme with unprecedented energy, transforming the aged, malodorous city. The new Paris was a showcase city, with the first department stores and the International Exhibition of 1867. With so much building work, there was plenty of opportunity for speculation. The world capital of sensual pleasure was again decried as a 'New Babylon'. The combination of sensuality and indulgent opulence of the Second Empire can be seen in the regime's most distinctive building, Charles Garnier's Palais Garnier. Haussmann was forced to resign in 1869 after some of his projects were found to be based on highly questionable accounts.
An excellent website - "France in the age of Les Mis" - walks you through the social history of the period: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/rschwart/hist255-s01/
1870-71: Franco-Prussian War
In 1870, the Emperor was maneouvred into war with the German states, led by Bismarck's Prussia. The French were crushed at Sedan, on 4 September 1870; Napoléon III abdicated. Days later, a new Republic was proclaimed to much cheering at the Hôtel de Ville. Yet within weeks Paris was under Prussian siege. Beleaguered Parisians starved. The French government negotiated a temporary armistice, then hastily arranged elections for a National Assembly mandated to make peace. Paris voted republican, but the majority went to conservative monarchists. The peace agreed at Versailles on 28 January 1871 - a five billion-franc indemnity, occupation by 30,000 German troops and ceding of Alsace-Lorraine - was seen as a betrayal. Worse, the new Assembly under Adolphe Thiers spurned the mutinous capital for Versailles.
1871: the Paris commune
Paris was marked by revolution in the 19th century and none proved bloodier nor more consequential than the last. March to May 1871 remains engraved in the collective memory of the left and the working class, rivetingly portrayed in prints and newspapers at the Musée de l'Art et d'Histoire de St-Denis.
On 18 March 1871, Adolphe Thiers sent a detachment of soldiers to Montmartre to collect 200 cannons from the Garde Nationale, paid for through public subscription to defend the city during the German siege. The mission ended badly; insurrectionists led by schoolteacher Louise Michels fended off the troops. Thiers immediately ordered all government officials and the army to head for Versailles, leaving the city in the hands of the poor and a wide-ranging spectrum of radicals. On 26 March, the Commune of Paris was proclaimed at the Hôtel de Ville. The Commune's Assembly comprised workers, clerks, accountants, journalists, lawyers, teachers, artists, doctors and a handful of small business owners, who decreed the separation of Church and State, the secularisation of schools, abolition of night work in bakeries, creation of workers' cooperatives, and a moratorium on debts and rents. There was no question of abolishing private property, since the worker's fundamental aim was to own an atelier.
Artists got swept up in Commune fever. A federation established in April 1871 attracted such talents as Corot, Daumier, Manet and Millet. Its mission: to suppress the Academy and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, in favour of art freed of governmental sanctions. Courbet reopened the Louvre and the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle. On 12 April, the column on place Vendôme celebrating Napoléon's victories was knocked down.
While support for the Commune was palpable amongst workers and intellectuals, their lack of organisation and political experience proved fatal, and they were also outnumbered. In a matter of days Thiers and his Versaillais troops began their assault on the city. On 4 April, the Commune's two principal military strategists, Flourens and Duval, were taken prisoner and executed. By 11 April, Thiers' troops had retaken the suburbs.La Semaine sanglante
Soon barrages of artillery encircled the city, while inside Paris barricades of sandbags and barbed wire sprung up. Men, women and even children were caught up in house-to-house fighting. On 21 May, in the week dubbed the Semaine sanglante (Bloody Week), Thiers' Versaillais entered the city through the Porte de St-Cloud, and captured Auteuil, Passy and the 15th arrondissement. Within three days more than half the city was retaken. On 28 May, among the tombs of the Cimetière Père Lachaise, 147 Communards were cornered and executed, against the 'Mur des Fédérés', today a moving memorial to the insurrection.
An estimated 3,000-4,000 Communards were killed in combat, compared with 877 Versaillais. The Commune retaliated by kidnapping and killing the Archbishop of Paris and other clergy, setting fire to a third of the city. 'Paris will be ours or Paris will no longer exist!' vowed 'the red virgin' Louise Michels. The Hôtel de Ville and Tuileries palace were set ablaze. Although the Hôtel de Ville was rebuilt, the Tuileries was ultimately torn down in 1880.
At least 10,000 Communards were shot, many buried under public squares and pavements. Some 40,000 were arrested and over 5,000 deported, including Louise Michels to New Caledonia for seven years.
The Third republic
The Third Republic, established in 1871, was an unloved compromise, although it survived for 70 years. The right yearned for the restoration of the monarchy; to the left, the Republic was tainted by its suppression of the Commune.
Paris' busy boulevards, railway stations and cafés provided inspiration for the Impressionists, led by Monet, Renoir, Manet, Degas and Pissarro. Rejected by the official Salon, their first exhibition took place in 1874 in photographer Félix Nadar's atelier, on boulevard des Capucines.
The city celebrated its faith in science and progress with two World Exhibitions. The 1889 exhibition was designed to mark the centenary of the Revolution and confirm the respectability of the Third Republic. Centrepiece was a giant iron structure, the Eiffel Tower. On 1 April 1900 another World Exhibition greeted the new century. A futuristic city sprang up along the Seine, of which the Grand and Petit Palais, ornate Pont Alexandre III and Gare d'Orsay (now Musée d'Orsay) remain. In July, the first Paris Métro shuttled passengers from Porte Maillot to Vincennes, in the unheard-of time of 25 minutes. The 1900 Exhibition drew over 50 million visitors.
The Dreyfus case
After the defeat of 1870, many were obsessed with the need for 'revenge' and the recovery of Alsace-Lorraine; a frustration also expressed in xenophobia and anti-Semitism. These strands came together in the Dreyfus case, which polarised French society.
In 1894, a Jewish army officer, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, was accused of spying for Germany, quickly condemned and sent off to Devil's Island. As the facts emerged, suspicion pointed clearly at another officer. Leftists and liberals took up Dreyfus' case, such as Emile Zola, who published his defence of Dreyfus, J'Accuse, in L'Aurore in January 1898. Rightists were bitterly opposed, sometimes taking the view that the honour of the army should not be questioned, although divisions were not always clear: radical future prime minister Clemenceau supported Zola, but so also did the prince of Monaco. Such were the passions mobilised that fights broke out in the street. Dreyfus was eventually released in 1900.The Naughty 90s
Paris of the flamboyant 1890s was synonymous with illicit pleasures. In 1889, impresario Maurice Zidler opened the Moulin Rouge, which successfully repackaged a half-forgotten dance called the chahut as the can-can. In 1894, what is believed to have been the world's first strip joint opened nearby on rue des Martyrs, the Divan Fayouac, with a routine titled Le Coucher d'Yvette (Yvette Goes to Bed). The belle époque ('beautiful era', a phrase coined in the 1920s in a wave of nostalgia after World War I) was a time of prestigious artistic activity. The city was an immovable feast of oysters and champagne - until August 1914.
The 20th Century
The Great WarOn 2 August 1914, France learned that war with Germany was imminent. Many Parisians rejoiced, it seemed that the long-awaited opportunity for 'revenge' had come. However, the Allied armies were steadily pushed back. Paris filled with refugees, and by 2 September the Germans were just 15 miles from the city. The government took refuge in Bordeaux, entrusting Paris' defence to General Galliéni. What then occurred was later glorified as the 'Miracle on the Marne'. Troops were ferried to the front in Paris taxis. By 13 September, the Germans were pushed back to the Oise; Paris was safe. In the trenches battles raged on.
Defeatism emerged after the catastrophic battle of Verdun in 1916 inflicted appalling damage on the French army. Parisian spirits were further sapped by a flu epidemic and the shells of 'Big Bertha' - a gigantic German cannon levelled at the city from 75 miles away. The veteran Clemenceau was made prime minister in 1917 to restore morale. On 11 November, the Armistice was finally signed in the forest of Compiègne. Celebrations lasted for days, but the war had cut a swathe through France's population, killing over a million men.
The Interwar Years
Paris emerged from the War with a restless energy. Artistic life centred on Montparnasse, a bohemian whirl of colourful émigrés and daring cabarets. The Depression did not hit France until after 1930, but when it arrived, it unleashed a wave of political violence. On 6 February 1934, Fascist and extreme right-wing groups tried to invade the Assemblée Nationale. Fire hoses and bullets beat them back. Fifteen were killed, 1,500 wounded. Faced with Fascism and the economic situation, Socialists and Communists united to create the Popular Front.
In 1936, Socialist Léon Blum was elected to head a Popular Front government. In the euphoric 'workers' spring' of 1936, workers were given the right to form unions, a 40-hour week and, for the first time, paid holidays. By the autumn, debates about the Spanish Civil War had split the coalition, and the economic situation had deteriorated. Blum's government fell in June 1937. The working class was disenchanted, and fear of Communism strengthened right-wing parties. Tragically, each camp feared the enemy within far more than what was waiting on its doorstep.
The Second World War
Britain and France declared war on Germany in September 1939, but for months this meant only the drôle de guerre (phoney war), characterised by rumour and inactivity. On 10 May 1940, Germany invaded France, Belgium and Holland. By 6 June, the French army had been crushed and the Germans were near Paris. A shell-shocked government left for Bordeaux; archives and works of art were bundled off to safety. Overnight the city emptied. The population of Greater Paris was 4.96 million in 1936, by the end of May 1940 it was 3.5 million. By 27 June about 1.9 million remained.
Paris fell on 14 June 1940 with virtually no resistance. The German Army marched along the Champs-Elysées. At the Hôtel de Ville, the tricolore was lowered and the swastika raised. The French cabinet voted to request an armistice, and Maréchal Pétain, an elderly First World War hero, dissolved the Third Republic and took over. The Germans occupied two-thirds of France, while the French government moved south to Vichy. A young, autocratic general, Charles de Gaulle, went to London to organise a Free French opposition movement.
The Nazi insignia soon hung from every public building, including the Eiffel Tower. Hitler visited Paris only once, on 23 June 1940, taking in the Palais Garnier, Eiffel Tower and Napoléon's tomb at the Invalides. Leaving the city, he observed: 'Wasn't Paris beautiful?… In the past, I often considered whether we would not have to destroy Paris. But when we are finished in Berlin, Paris will only be a shadow. So why should we destroy it?'The Occupation
Paris was the Germans' western headquarters and a very attractive assignment compared to, for example, Russia. They lapped up luxury goods, and swamped Paris' best night spots, restaurants and hotels. There was no shortage of Parisians who accepted them, and warmed to an enemy who offered a champagne lifestyle. Maurice Chevalier and the actress Arletty were later condemned for having performed for, or having still closer contacts with, the Germans, as was Coco Chanel.
Private cars were banned and replaced with horse-drawn carriages and vélo-taxis, carts towed behind a bicycle. Bread, sugar, butter, cheese, meat, coffee and eggs were rationed. City parks and rooftops were made into vegetable gardens and a substitute for coffee, dubbed café national, was made with ground acorns and chickpeas. Occupied Paris had its share of pro-Vichy bureaucrats who preferred to work with the Germans than embrace a seemingly futile opposition. There were also attentistes (wait and see-ers) and opportunist black marketeers. Even so, many were prepared to risk the Gestapo torture chambers at rue des Saussaies, avenue Foch or rue Lauriston. By summer 1941, in response to the activities of the patriots organised from Britain, the executions of French underground fighters had begun.
Deportation of Jews
There was also the rounding-up and deportation of Jews, in which the role of the Vichy authorities remains a sensitive issue. On 29 June 1940, Jews were ordered to register with the police; on 11 November, all Jewish businesses were required to post a yellow sign. The wearing of the yellow star was introduced in May 1942, soon followed by regulations prohibiting Jews from restaurants, cinemas, theatres, beaches, and most jobs.
The first deportations of Jews (most foreign-born) took place on 14 May 1941. In July 1942, 12,000 Jews were summoned to the Vélodrome d'Hiver (the winter cycling stadium) in Paris. The Vichy Chief of Police ensured that not only Jews aged over 18, but also thousands of young children not on the original orders, were deported in what is known as the Vél d'Hiv. A monument commemorating the event was installed on the quai de Grenelle in July 1994. Not all stood for the persecution of the Jews. Many were hidden during the war, and a number of government officials tacitly assisted them with ration cards and false papers. While one-third of French Jews were killed in concentration camps during the war, the remaining two-thirds were saved, largely through the efforts of French citizens.
The Liberation
In June 1944, the Allies invaded Normandy. German troops began to retreat east, and Parisians saw a real opportunity to retake their city. On 10 to 18 August there were strikes on the Métro and of public services; people began to sense that liberation was at hand.
On 19 August, a tricolore was hoisted at the Hôtel de Ville, and the Free French forces launched an insurrection, occupying several buildings. On 23 August, Hitler ordered his commander, Von Choltitz, to destroy the capital. Von Choltitz stalled, an inaction for which he would later be honoured by the French government. On 25 August, General Leclerc's French 2nd Armoured Division, put at the head of the US forces so that it would be French troops who first entered Paris, arrived by the Porte d'Orléans. The city went wild. There were still snipers hidden on rooftops, but in the euphoria no one seemed to care. Late in the afternoon, De Gaulle made his way down the Champs-Elysées to the Hôtel de Ville. 'We are living minutes that go far beyond our paltry lives,' he cried out to an ecstatic crowd.Those who had led the fight against Vichy and the Germans felt that now was the time to build a new society and a new republic. The National Resistance Council's postwar reform programme was generally approved and De Gaulle was proclaimed provisional President. At first vigilante justice prevailed and severe punishments were doled out. However many former Vichy officials escaped trial and rose within the administration. As the economy began to revive, thousands flocked to the capital. In 1946, there were 6.6 million inhabitants in greater Paris, by 1950 that number had increased by 700,000. In response, the state built villes nouvelles (new towns) and low-income housing.
The Algerian War
De Gaulle relinquished office in 1946, and the Fourth Republic was established. Thereafter, French troops were constantly engaged in a battle to save France's disintegrating Empire. Vietnam was lost in 1954, but after revolt broke out in Algeria in 1956 socialist prime minister Guy Mollet sent in almost half a million troops. Mutinous army officers, opposed to any 'sell-out' of the French settlers in Algeria, took over government headquarters in Algiers. The Fourth Republic admitted defeat. In May 1958 De Gaulle came back.
De Gaulle & the Fifth republic
De Gaulle appeared to promise one thing to French settlers while negotiating with rebel leaders for Algeria's independence. On 17 October 1961, the pro-independence FLN demonstrated in Paris, and police shot at the crowd. Officially only three were killed, but recently released archives show that over 300 bodies were fished out of the Seine alone. Algeria became independent in 1962, and some 700,000 embittered colonists returned to France.
The state was again under pressure to provide housing and radical urbanisation plans were hastily drawn up. Historic areas were considered sacrosanct, but large areas succumbed to the ball and chain: the 'Manhattanisation' of Paris had begun. André Malraux, Minister of Culture, however, did ensure the preservation of the historic Marais. The post-war mood of crisis was over, and into the breach thundered a sharp, fresh 'new wave' of cinema directors, novelists and critics and filmmakers who gained international status, including Truffaut, Melville and Godard.
May 1968Meanwhile trouble was brewing in the student quarter. Their numbers swelled the over-stretched French educational system and dissatisfaction with the authoritarian nature of the state was widespread. In May 1968 the students took to the streets. On 3 May, paving stones were torn up, perhaps inspired by the Situationist group's slogan 'sous les pavés, la plage' ('beneath the paving stones, the beach'). By mid-May, workers and trade unions at Renault and Sud-Aviation had joined in; six million people went on strike across France.
De Gaulle's proposed referendum was rejected with the worst night of violence. An anti-strike demonstration was held on the Champs-Elysées; workers went back to their factories. If not a political revolution, May 1968 forced an attitude of open debate and consolidated a new generation, many of whom now constitute the French establishment. De Gaulle lost a referendum in early 1969, and retired to his provincial retreat, where he died in 1970.
1970: Georges Pompidou
Georges Pompidou or Pom-Pom - as De Gaulle's successor was often called - didn't preside over any earth-shattering political developments. What the Conservative leader did do was begin the process that radically changed the architectural face of Paris, implanting an uncompromisingly avant-garde building, the Centre Pompidou, in the heart of one it's oldest neighbourhoods. He also built the expressways along the Seine and gave the go-ahead to the redevelopment of Les Halles.
Valery Giscard d'Estaing
After Pompidou's sudden death, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing became president in 1974. He made clear his desire to transform France into 'an advanced liberal society'. Notable among his decisions were those to transform Gare d'Orsay into a museum, and the creation of a science museum in the abattoirs at La Villette.
François Mitterrand
In an abrupt political turnaround, the Socialists, led by François Mitterrand, swept into power in 1981. The mood in Paris was initially electric, although after nationalising some banks and industries, Socialist France of the prosperous 1980s turned out to be not wildly different from Gaullist France. In Paris, the period was defined by the feuding between Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac, Paris' right-wing mayor since 1977.
Mitterrand cherished ambitions to transform Paris. His Grands Projets began with the Louvre and the Louvre pyramid and included the Grande Arche de la Defénse. He transferred the Ministry of Finance to a new complex at Bercy as part of a programme for the renewal of eastern Paris along with Opéra Bastille. The controversial Bibliothèque Nationale François Mitterrand was completed after Mitterrand's death in January 1996.
Despite policies of decentralisation, Paris remained the intellectual and artistic hub of France. Competition between government and mayor actually helped the capital's artistic growth: large-scale Paris-funded exhibitions at the Petit Palais and Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris rivaled those held at the national Grand Palais and Centre Pompidou.
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