THE LUXURY OF VERSAILLES
The Splendors of the Chateau--its Apartments and Gardens, the Hall of
Mirrors
In planning the interior decorations at Versailles, the numerous
company of artists employed by the sovereign devised a scheme of
ornamentation inspired by the arts of ancient Rome. Mythological and
historical subjects were utilized for the glorification of the Grand
Monarch. A _Description_ of the chateau, officially printed in 1674,
gives us the key to the interpretation of the allegories. "As the Sun
is the device of the King, and poets represent the Sun and Apollo as
one, nothing exists in this superb dwelling that does not bear relation
to the Sun divinity."
The emblem of Apollo was in evidence everywhere; signs of the month
ornamented facades and walls; and inside the palace and out were
symbols of the seasons and the hours of the day. The King's apartment
bore on its ceiling and walls paintings depicting deeds of seven heroes
of Antiquity, supported by Louis' planet emblem. All the interior
decoration was Italian in style--marble wainscoting in window
embrasures, floors of marble, panels of marble, doors of repousse
bronze. The apartments of Anne of Austria and the Gallery of Apollo at
the Louvre offered the first examples in France of this decorative
style, and guided the artists at Versailles in making their plans.
Upon the Grand Apartments of the King and Queen alone, a dozen painters
were engaged between the years 1671 and 1680. Charles Lebrun directed
the artists, most of whom, be it said, were poor colorists. He himself
worked on the vault above the Stairway of the Ambassadors and in the
Hall of Mirrors. To imitate Italian works of art was at that time the
avowed ideal of French decorators. At Rome the King's purse paid the
expenses of a group of young artists who were allotted the task of
copying designs that were later evolved at Versailles. To some was
assigned the copying of ornaments made of metal, mosaic and inlay.
Others specialized on bronze and wood-carving designs. There were
painters who made only sketches of battle scenes and sieges. There
were sculptors on the King's staff of copyists, and goldsmiths, and
enamel workers. Flemish, Dutch, French, but principally Italian,
craftsmen were recruited from the art centers of Europe, "for the glory
of the King." At the Gobelin Tapestry Factory--a royal
establishment--the workers were directed by Charles Lebrun, who for
many years had been head of the "Royal Manufactory of Crown Furniture."
It was in the year 1677 that Louis XIV formally proclaimed Versailles
his residence and the seat of Government. It was for the purpose of
providing quarters for the Court and its attendants that Mansard was
commanded to enlarge the chateau. Versailles now became, in truth, the
temple of royalty. The newly appointed architect gave to the chateau
its final aspect; the stamp of his genius rests upon the exterior
design and interior embellishment of the most remarkable dwelling in
the history of French architecture.
[Illustration: Versailles]
When the Court came to live at Versailles in May, 1682, Mansard and his
builders were still feverishly occupied in the work of construction and
reconstruction. The year 1684 saw the end of the ornamentation of the
interior in the completion of the Hall of Mirrors. Mansard's style is
particularly impressed upon the Marble Stairway, and the adjacent Hall
of the Queen's Guards, and, above all, on the Grand Gallery of the
Mirrors and the Salons (Peace and War) that flank it--works truly
impressive in their proportions, adornment and arrangement.
Disposed about three sides of the main court, the red chateau was set
low on a slight rise of land. The main entrance was flanked by the
North Wing and the South Wing, interrupted throughout their length by
lesser courts. The domed chapel upreared to the right of the gate was
the fourth one to serve the palace. After a period of building lasting
ten years it was consecrated in the year 1710. The exquisite white
stone edifice is still regarded as an architectural gem. Its interior
embellishments were carried out by some of the best artists of the Sun
King's epoch. Here during the last years of his long and spectacular
reign, Louis the Great worshiped. Here Marie Antoinette was married to
the Sixteenth Louis.
Arrivals at the palace were admitted from the Place d'Armes to the
court designated for their reception. Only the King and his family
might enter by the central gate. Nobles passed through the gates at
the side. Privileged persons were permitted to alight in the Royal
Court; those of inferior prestige in the Court of the Ministers, which
gave entrance to the offices and living quarters of the palace
executives and the hundreds of minions composing the King's retinue.
On the left of the enclosure called the Marble Court was the vestibule
to the Marble Stairway; opposite was the doorway leading to the
renowned Stairway of the Ambassadors, later removed by command of Louis
XV. The royal suites, except those of the Dauphin and his attendants,
were on the second floor. These rooms beneath the ornate Mansard attic
were the scene of all the potent events and ceremonies that have
distinguished Versailles above the palaces of the world.
Grouped above the Marble Court at the far end of the main court of the
chateau, were the State Apartments of the King. Though, in later
times, the sequence of some of these salons was changed, in the years
when the Sun King occupied them they comprised the Salon of Venus,
opening upon the Ambassadors' Staircase, the Salon of Diana, the Salon
of Mars, and the Salon of Mercury. These halls formed a magnificent
prelude to the still greater magnificence of the Salon of Apollo,--the
Throne Room where guests came into the presence of the King himself.
The Salon of Venus was most admired for its marble mosaics and its
ceiling painting representing Venus subduing all the other deities. In
Louis' day, as now, the royal master of all this grandeur was here
portrayed in white marble, garbed in the robes of a Roman emperor.
Diana and her nymphs were depicted on the ceiling of the salon named
for the Goddess of the Hunt. Here under candles glimmering in sconces
of silver and crystal the courtiers engaged in games of billiards,
while their ladies disposed themselves gracefully upon tapestried
seats. And there were orange trees in silver tubs to add brilliance to
the scene. In the Salon of Mars dancing parties and concerts were
given. Silver punchbowls set on silver tables offered refreshment to
the gay throng that coquetted and danced and applauded beneath the
triumphant picture of Mars limned upon the ceiling. This room was
a-glitter with silver, cut glass and gold embroidered draperies. In
the crimson-hung Salon of Mercury was the King's bed of state, before
which was a balustrade of silver. In all the Grand Apartments were
hangings and furniture of extraordinary richness. There were tables of
gilded wood and mosaic, Florentine marbles, pedestals of porphyry for
vases of precious metal, ebony cabinets inlaid with copper, columns of
jasper, agate and lapis lazuli, silver chandeliers, branched
candle-sticks, baskets, vessels for liqueurs, silver perfuming pans.
Windows were draped with silver brocade worked in gold thread, with
Venetian silks and satins, or embroideries from the Gobelin studios.
On the floors, originally of marble, were spread carpets woven in
designs symbolical of kingly power.
The Throne Room known as the Salon of Apollo--the seat of the Sun
King--was of the utmost richness. The throne itself was of silver and
stood eight feet high. Tapestries represented scenes of splendor in
the life of Louis the Great and on the walls were masterpieces by
Italian artists of the first rank, which were later deemed worthy of a
place in the Louvre. Much of the treasure vanished in the years
1689-1690 when the King was constrained to raise money for his depleted
treasury. In December, 1682, the _Mercure Galant_, desirous of
pleasing its readers, always avid of details about everything that
concerned their King, published a long description of the furnishings
of the State Apartments--the velvet hangings, the marble walls enriched
with gold relief, the chimney-pieces bossed with silver.
Yet the glory of these apartments was outdone by the later achievements
of architect and decorators in the Salons of War and Peace and the Hall
of Mirrors that joins them. In the cupola of the Salon of War the
great Lebrun painted an allegorical picture of France hurling
thunderbolts and carrying a shield blazoned with the portrait of King
Louis, while Bellona, Spain, Holland and Germany are shown crouching in
awe. The colored marbles of the walls contrasted brilliantly with
gilded copper bas-reliefs. Six portraits of Roman emperors contributed
to the impressiveness of the Salon, and on the wall was a stucco relief
of the King of France on horseback, clad like a Roman. The Salon of
Peace was also decorated by Lebrun's adept brush. A ceiling piece
portrays France and her conquered enemies rejoicing in the fruits of
Peace. And, again, there are portraits of the ever-present Louis and
the Caesars of Rome. Both these splendid halls remain to-day much as
they were in the time of their creator.
Most lavish is the decoration of the Grand Hall of Mirrors--"the
epitome of absolutism and divine right and the grandeur of the House of
Bourbon." For two hundred and forty feet it extends along the terrace
that surveys the gardens where Louis XIV and his successors delighted
to ordain fetes of unimaginable gayety. Gorgeously costumed courtiers,
women that dictated the fate of dynasties, diplomats of our day bent
upon the solution of world-rocking problems, all have gazed from this
resplendent gallery upon the fountains and allees that beautify the
scene below. Seventeen lofty windows are matched by as many Venetian
framed mirrors. Between each window and each mirror are pilasters
designed by Coyzevox, Tubi and Caffieri--reigning masters of their
time. Walls are of marble embellished with bronze-gilt trophies; large
niches contain statues in the antique style. The gilded cornice is by
Coyzevox, the ceiling by Lebrun. The conception of the latter
comprises more than a score of paintings representing events that had
to do with wars waged by Louis the Great against Holland, Germany and
Spain. In the period when Versailles was the residence of kings--not a
museum, alone, and the assembly-place of international Councils--the
tables in the Grand Gallery, the benches between the windows, the
many-branched candelabra, the tubs in which orange trees grew, were all
of heavy silver. Thousands of wax candles lighted the salon, some of
them set in immense chandeliers, others in lusters of silver and
crystal. But Louis the Fourteenth's reign was not yet over when he was
compelled to send many hundred pieces of his precious furniture to the
mint, and the superb appointments of the Hall of Mirrors were partially
substituted by furnishings of wood and damask.
[Illustration: The Hall of Mirrors]
Visitors to Versailles view the private or "little" apartments of King
Louis the Great, Louis XV and Louis XVI. The superb bedchamber of
Louis XIV contains the bed in which the French Monarch died on
September 1, 1715. In an ante-chamber, later called the Bull's Eye by
reason of its unique oval window, courtiers were wont to gossip and
intrigue while they awaited the King's rising. A quaint painting by a
French artist presents Louis XIV and his family in the character of
pagan deities. Next to the Bull's Eye was the room in which the King
dined on occasion. The Hall of the King's Guards was near of approach
to the Marble Staircase and to the ample and ornate apartments of
Madame de Maintenon. The wonders of this Hall are also departed. In a
group of small rooms were rich stores of objects of art, medals,
cameos, onyx, bronzes, and gems of great value.
The State Apartments of the Queens of France were entirely altered in
their decoration as one queen succeeded another. Marie Therese was the
first to occupy them. We are told that before her bed there stood a
railing of silver, that later gave way, for economical reasons, to one
carved in wood. In the Grand Cabinet the wife of Louis the Great
received in audience those that the King commanded. Here, at the end
of a short and insignificant period as mistress of Versailles, Marie
Therese died, July 30, 1683.
One of the few apartments that still retains the aspect it bore in King
Louis the Fourteenth's reign is the Hall of the Queen's Guards, which
had a door on the landing of the marble stair, also called the Queen's
Staircase. This was the flight of steps most used in the time of
Louis, since it led to the apartments of the sovereign, the Queen
Madame de Maintenon.
The Ambassadors' Staircase, across the court, was of the richest
possible decoration, but like the glory of the Kings of France, it has
passed into oblivion. Louis commanded that it be paved and walled in
marble from the choicest quarries, vaulted with bronze, graced by
fountains. Amazing frescoes representing a brilliant assemblage of
people of all nations adorned the walls. Of this staircase a reporter
of the epoch wrote, "When full of light it vies in magnificence with
the richest apartments of the most beautiful palace in the world."
Which palace was, of course, Versailles.
The Grand Hall of the Guards, the apartments of the Children of France
and their governess, the ten rooms that composed the suite of the
Dauphin, the Grand Hall of Battles--each had its special decoration.
"At the house of Monseigneur," wrote an old chronicler of the Court,
"one sees in the cabinets an exquisite collection of all that is most
rare and precious, not only in respect to the necessary furniture,
tables, porcelains, mirrors, chandeliers, but also paintings by the
most famous masters, bronzes, vases of agate, jewels and cameos." For
one dazzling table of carved silver in the apartment of the King's son,
the silversmith that fashioned it was paid thirty thousand dollars.
Beneath the state apartments of the King was the Hall of the Baths
lined with marble and adorned with beautiful paintings. Upon the
marble tubs, the tessellated floors, the gilded columns and mirrors of
this apartment a great sum was expended.
* * * * *
Versailles at last was finished--and what a spectacle and monument to
selfish exaltation it was! "There is an intimate relation between the
King and his chateau," wrote Imbert de Saint-Amand. "The idol is
worthy of the temple, the temple of the idol. There is always
something immaterial, something moral so to speak, in monuments, and
they derive their poesy from the thought connected with them. For a
cathedral, it is the idea of God. For Versailles, it is the idea of
the King. Its mythology is but a magnificent allegory of which Louis
XIV is the reality. It is he always and everywhere. Fabulous heroes
and divinities impart their attributes to him or mingle with his
courtiers. In honor of him, Neptune sheds broadcast the waters that
cross in air in sparkling arches. Apollo, his favorite symbol,
presides over this enchanted world as the god of light, the inspirer of
the muses; the sun of the god seems to pale before that of the great
King. Nature and art combine to celebrate the glory of the sovereign
by a perpetual hosannah. All that generations of kings have amassed in
pictures, statues and precious movables is distributed as mere
furniture in the glittering apartments of the chateau. The
intoxicating perfumes of luxury and power throw one into a sort of
ecstasy that makes comprehensible the exaltation of this monarch,
enthusiastic over himself, who, in chanting the hymns composed in his
praise, shed tears of admiration."