If you can't live in the Louvre in the center of Paris, why move to Versailles?
Mainly for political reasons. After Louis XIV came to power, the top priority was to strengthen centralization. After the royal family moved to Versailles, the nobles also moved in, so the king could better monitor their every move and greatly strengthened the monarchy. Since then, Versailles has become the political center of France, and Louis XV and Louis XVI also lived here until the French Revolution broke out in 1789.
The prototype of Versailles is the Hunting Palace in Louis XIII. It will cost 7000 Wan Li Foer to transform it into a palace, which is about 65.438+0.05 billion euros, or about 7.35 billion yuan. Versailles has a huge garden, mirror gallery, artificial lake, palace complex and fountain landscape, which is luxurious to the extreme. When people travel to Versailles today, they can't help feeling: What's it like to live in such a palace?
William ritchie Newton, an expert in the history of Versailles, wrote "Behind the Door: Palace Life and Power Stage in Versailles in the 8th Century/Kloc-0", which is like a panorama, showing the life of various groups in Versailles. He explained the feeling of living in Versailles from seven aspects: shelter, food, water, heating, cleaning and laundry. Here, there are prosperity and extravagance, as well as desolation and humbleness, and the details of life in Versailles are unobstructed.
The residents of Versailles mainly include the royal family, courtiers and servants. Let's follow in the footsteps of william ritchie Newton and take a "real life" trip to Versailles.
In Versailles, the living conditions of kings, queens and other members of the royal family are naturally the best.
Taking food as an example, Louis XIV often held "big banquets", and the types of dishes were very rich, including:
Untouched "leftovers" are first given to the king's personal servants, who can share them with one of their own servants. Sometimes they also sell "leftovers" to some small vendors, so that ordinary residents of Versailles can enjoy a little delicious food enjoyed by the king.
In terms of lighting, in Queen Marie Antoinette's bedroom, 20 Wan Li francs are spent on candles every year. 175 1 year, held a banquet to celebrate the birth of the eldest son of the prince, and equipped with 8000 candles.
However, the life of the royal family also faces difficulties from time to time, such as resource shortage, air pollution and water pollution. As the population of Versailles increases, there is not enough room for washing and drying clothes. At one time, the king's shirts and underwear were even washed in the drinking trough of the big stable. The queen doesn't even have a special laundry room and sink. Lady Michio, the queen's attendant, once applied for a special laundry pool, but was coldly rejected by the Royal Ministry of Construction.
However, due to the design defects of drainage facilities, inadequate maintenance and untimely toilets, the air in Versailles often smells bad, so the king had to live in Fontainebleau and Mali Palace.
In addition to officials at all levels, members of the royal family often have "honorary female officials" and personal attendants, most of whom are nobles. When they followed the king to Versailles, they found that there were not enough houses in the palace.
In order to solve the housing problem, the king will give his servants land to build houses near Versailles. Of course, there are certain constraints, such as paying land tax and building a house within a certain period of time. But many people still want to live in the palace, because they think that the closer they are to the king, the more noble they are.
The serious imbalance between supply and demand often leads to house grabbing wars, and sometimes the application ratio even reaches 1: 1 1. It took Louis XV four months to change the owner of the house 10 in order to change the neighbors for his mistress Madame de Pompadour.
I finally applied for a house and lived in Versailles, but there are still many problems to be solved if I want to live comfortably.
For example, the problem of heating, the room is too cold in winter, and I want to install a stove, or the chimney does not smoke and blackens the furniture, and I want a "hard chimney". Or the room is too dark. I want to add some mirrors or candlesticks to make the room brighter. At this time, you must write to the director of the Royal Building Department to apply. Princess Rambalay, a good friend of Queen Mary, applied to the Royal Department of Architecture for a small table with snail feet and candlesticks. Her husband, Duke Pontiwell, asked for four large mirrors in his suite.
After the application is submitted, it often happens that the application is rejected or lost. There are many reasons, for example, it may affect the symmetry and harmony of the building facade, lack funds, and may cause a fire. So many people have to put up with the problem of low comfort at home.
In Versailles, servants are the largest but most easily overlooked group.
From the perspective of working hours, servants have different categories such as quarterly work, annual work and weekly work. In some dormitories, trade unions hold several posts through donations to achieve the purpose of working in the palace for a long time, such as working in the kitchen for the past few months and working in the cleaning department for several months.
Servants are also divided into three or six grades, which is reflected in accommodation, diet, salary and so on. In terms of diet, the general manager of the palace and the big attendants can hold an "honor banquet" to invite guests with certain status to attend. Managers, chamberlains and priests can hold a "second-class banquet" in the big affiliated palace to entertain some attendants. Some servants can only get meager food supplements and eat in restaurants in the city.
There are many kinds of jobs in Versailles. Taking cleaning as an example, the cleaning work in the palace covers many projects, such as road cleaners, floor cleaners, livestock cleaners, chimney workers, chimney maintenance workers, window maintenance workers and so on. Some jobs are contracted by several families all year round. For example, the Montigny and Gerard families are responsible for window maintenance, and they have served the royal family for generations.
Servants' wages for hard work are not always paid on time, which sometimes affects the normal operation of Versailles. 17 in the 1970s, the palace was short of water and needed to build a new reservoir. However, the salary of 7,400 livres owed to each construction worker was delayed, which seriously hindered the progress of the project. Bos, who is responsible for cleaning the chimney, also owes 7732 livres. Once the chimney is not repaired in time, the possible fire risk can not be underestimated.
1In the 1970s and 1980s, people even refused to serve as attendants or female officials in the court. Once-hot positions gradually became cold, and people began to yearn for a more comfortable and comfortable life in Paris and the countryside.
Pushing open the golden door of Versailles Palace, william ritchie Newton took us through the life scenes of kings, courtiers and servants one by one. People behind the door need places to eat, wash clothes, light and warm, happy banquets and hard work. Every day is extremely vivid and real.
It's just that everyone is inevitably caught in the great changes in history. Louis XIV, the once mighty "sun king", brought the extravagance and extravagance of Versailles to the peak. 100 years later 1789, the French revolution broke out and Louis XVI and Queen Mary were guillotined by the French people. What is the fate of Princess Rambala mentioned above? According to Linda in "Take a Book to Paris":
All the light has become the past. In the subsequent period of revolutionary terror, Versailles Palace was looted by the people, and the royal family and nobles were beheaded or fled everywhere. Later, Versailles became a museum of French history, and thousands of tourists visited it every year.
Yuan Zhen wrote a poem: "In the faded old Forbidden City, peonies were red, but no one came to see them. The ladies-in-waiting are already white-haired and arguing about the grand occasion of Tang Xuanzong. " If the princes and nobles living in Versailles can revisit their old places, they are likely to send out the same feelings.
(Image from the French TV series Versailles)