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218-592: The original palace was built beginning in 1722 for Louise Françoise de Bourbon , Duchess of Bourbon, the legitimised daughter of Louis XIV and the Marquise de Montespan . Four successive architects – Lorenzo Giardini, Pierre Cailleteau , Jean Aubert and Jacques Gabriel – completed the palace in 1728. It was then nationalised during the French Revolution . From 1795 to 1799, during the Directory , it

436-575: A costume ball celebrating carnival in 1745. By July, she was the King's mistress and was formally given the title of the Marquise de Pompadour. For the next twenty years, she was the King's confidante and advisor, helping him choose or demote ministers. Her opinions led to the downfall of some very competent ministers, including Machault d'Aurnouville and the Marquis d'Argenson , and to the promotion of

654-746: A British fleet in the Mediterranean and captured Minorca from Britain . Meanwhile, the French army greatly outnumbered its British and Prussian counterparts on the continent, and after some fighting France signed the Convention of Klosterzeven with the Duke of Cumberland , which resulted in French troops occupying parts of Hanover and the Hanoverians withdrawing from the conflict entirely. Another French army had already invaded Saxony and Hanover ,

872-540: A Catholic doctrine based largely on the teachings of Saint Augustine . Jansenism had attracted many important followers in France, including the philosopher Blaise Pascal , the poet Racine , aristocrats including Madame de Sévigné and Madame de Lafayette. The faculty of the Sorbonne, then primarily a theological college and a center of Jansenism, demanded clarification from the government. The Jansenists were allied with

1090-631: A French invasion of the rest of the Netherlands, urged a quick settlement, despite objections from Austria and Sardinia. The Treaty was quickly negotiated and signed by all the parties in September and October 1748. Louis was also eager for a quick settlement, because the naval war with Britain was extremely costly to French maritime trade. The proposition of Louis was surprisingly generous; in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle , Louis offered to return all of

1308-492: A Regency Council made up of fourteen members until the new king reached the age of majority. Philippe, nephew of Louis XIV, was named president of this Council, but other members included the Duke of Maine and at least seven of his well-known allies. According to the will, all decisions were to be made by majority vote, meaning that the president could always be outvoted by Maine's party and effectively allowing Maine to rule France for

1526-702: A bell announces that the 3:00 p.m. session of the Assembly is about to begin. The room is lavishly decorated with a carpet from the period of Louis XIV, originally in Grand Gallery of the Louvre Palace ; and a tapestry which reproduces that tapestry of the School of Athens by Raphael that hangs over President's seat in the Assembly Chamber. The room was the original study of the house before

1744-455: A classical Roman by Jacques-Louis David and the bas-relief behind the tribune, made of carved white marble framed in dark polychrome marble. It features two female figures representing allegorical figures of History and Fame. Fame is announcing the laws with a long trumpet, while History is inscribing them on a tablet. In the center is a bust of Marianne , the symbol of the Republic, wearing

1962-594: A comparable sum and donate it freely to the government. His support for the church came both from the teachings of his tutor, Cardinal Fleury, and his gratitude to Archbishop de Beaumont, who defended him against the attacks of the Jansenists and the criticisms of the Parlement, and the Archbishop's tolerance of the King's own personal life and mistresses. Despite the French victories, the war dragged on both in

2180-495: A country house into a monumental palace, in the new classical revival style. With this end in mind, in 1768 he purchased the neighboring Hôtel de Lassay, and planned to make the two buildings into one. A new plan was drawn by Marie-Joseph Peyre , whose style was based on archeological studies of ancient Rome and Greece. Peyre's other neoclassical works included the Odéon Theater . Several different architects were engaged in

2398-520: A defensive treaty signed on 6 August 1726 between Prussia, Russia and Austria. In 1732 the coalition came into direct conflict with France over the succession to the Polish throne . The King of Poland and Elector of Saxony , Augustus II , was dying, and the favoured candidate to succeed him was Stanislaus I Leszczyński , the father of the Queen of France. In the same year Russia, Prussia and Austria signed

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2616-484: A distant sixteen-year-old cousin of her father. Her husband was the son of Henry Jules, Duke of Enghien , the son of the head of the House of Condé , a cadet branch of the reigning House of Bourbon . His mother was Anne Henriette of Bavaria . Louis XIV gave his daughter a large dowry of one million livres upon her marriage. At court, Louise Françoise's husband was known by the courtesy title of duc de Bourbon , and

2834-419: A dowry twice the amount given to her older sister, greatly angered Louise Françoise, who thereafter became quite competitive with her younger, more successful sister. Louise Françoise was a beautiful and vivacious woman. Around 1695, she began a romantic affair with François Louis de Bourbon, prince de Conti , the handsome brother-in-law of her older half-sister, Marie Anne de Bourbon . François Louis' wife

3052-501: A future Abbess of Remiremont Abbey . Unexpectedly, the dauphin died in 1711, ruining his sister's plan of establishing a more solid relationship with the Crown. Despite her dashed hopes, Louise Françoise was deeply affected by the dauphin's death. This death made her nephew, Louis, Duke of Burgundy , and his wife, Marie Adélaïde , the new Dauphin and Dauphine . Marie Adélaïde and Louise Françoise were to become bitter enemies because of

3270-610: A gallery to the Palais Bourbon, serves as the official residence of the National Assembly's president . The building underwent a major reconstruction in 1846–48 (see history), which added an additional story, but the 18th-century style of the exterior and interior layout of the building was preserved. The Cabinet du Départ takes its name from its function; the President of the Assembly departs from this room when

3488-501: A locomotive of the new railways. A third salon was painted by Abel de Pujol, who painted scenes from the history of governments in France, from Charlemagne to Louis-Philippe. The project of reconstruction included a new library, on the east side of the Palace. The style was highly classical, and resembled that of the ancient Roman baths; pillars supported five cupolas, over a gallery closed by two semi-circular bays. The lighting came from

3706-588: A major victory over the Austrians at the Battle of Mollwitz . On 18 May, Fleury assembled a new alliance combining France, Prussia, Spain and Bavaria, later joined by Poland and Sardinia. However, in 1742, the balance of the war shifted against France. The German-born British King, George II , who was also the Elector of Hanover, joined the war on the side of Austria and personally took charge of his soldiers fighting

3924-622: A medallion of the Roman god Janus, whose two faces illustrate the motto that the experience of the past predicts the future. The construction of the Chamber drastically modified the building, as the roof had to be raised well above the old facade. It was also out of alignment with the long axis composed of the Church of the Madeleine, the place de la Concorde, and the pont de la Concorde; the view of

4142-483: A military tour; her maternal aunt, the Marquise de Thianges , was there also. After returning from Tournai, her parents placed her and her older siblings in the care of one of her mother's acquaintances, the widowed Madame Scarron . On 19 December 1673, Louis XIV legitimised the children he had had with his mistress in a legitimisation process that was recognised with letters patent from the Parlement of Paris . At

4360-623: A new Constitution was adopted, which called for a parliament with two chambers, the Council of Five Hundred , the future National Assembly, and the Council of the Ancients. The Council of Five Hundred was given the Palais Bourbon as its future meeting place. The new government commissioned the architects Jacques-Pierre Gisors and Emmanuel-Cherubin Leconte to turn the apartments of the Palace along

4578-400: A number of incompetent military commanders. Her most successful choice was the promotion of the Duke de Choiseul , who became one of the King's most effective ministers. She ceased all sexual intimacy with the King by 1750, but remained his closest advisor and titular mistress . She was promoted to Duchess in 1752, and Dame of the Queen's Palace in 1756, and was an important patron of music and

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4796-522: A panorama of all the aspects of civilization. Despite the new construction, the Chamber of Deputies was still desperately short of space for meeting rooms and offices. The President of the Parliament lived far from the Palace – first on rue de Lille, then on Place Vendôme ; and the Duke of Bourbon still occupied the west wing of the Palais. The Chamber purchased the west wing of the Palace in 1830, and

5014-525: A portrait taken in widow's dress. When her husband died she is said to have been affected but Madame de Caylus did not believe her grief was sincere. In the hope of ingratiating herself with the future king, Louise Françoise frequently attended the court of her older half-brother, Monseigneur , at the Château de Meudon . At Meudon, she became close to Élisabeth Thérèse de Lorraine , princesse d'Epinoy and her older sister, Mademoiselle de Lillebonne ,

5232-480: A prime minister. Two of his ministers took the most prominent positions in his government; the finance minister, Jean Baptiste de Machault D'Arnouville , and the minister of the armies, Comte d'Argenson . With the end of the war, Louis decided to take the opportunity to reduce the debt and modernize the system of taxation of the Kingdom. The package of reforms was put together by his finance minister D'Arnouville and

5450-456: A recent innovation, skylights; it was later copied in the new National Library of France. The painter Eugène Delacroix was commissioned to paint the interior, a project which lasted from 1838 until 1846. Supported by a team of assistants, Delacroix painted the five cupolas and the two hemicycles of the library with a series of allegorical paintings on the themes of philosophy, natural history, legislation, eloquence, literature, poetry and theology;

5668-521: A regiment, and how to receive royal visitors. His guests included the Russian Tsar Peter the Great in 1717; at their first meeting and contrary to ordinary protocol between such great rulers, the two-meter-tall Tsar greeted Louis by picking him up under the arms and giving him a kiss. Louis also learned the skills of horseback riding and hunting, which became great passions. In 1720, following

5886-425: A result of these repressive acts, religious dissent remained an issue throughout the King's reign. Tension grew between the Duke of Bourbon and Cardinal de Fleury over the King's favor. The Duke's rigid and cold personality did not appeal to the young King, who turned to his old tutor for advice on how to run the affairs of state. When the King insisted that Fleury was to be included in all meetings between himself and

6104-471: A result, her younger sister's husband, the Duke of Orléans, became entitled to use the style of Monsieur le Prince . His wife, Louise Françoise's sister Françoise Marie, accordingly became entitled to use the style Madame la Princesse . Despite the fact that Françoise-Marie never referred to herself as Madame la Princesse, this transfer in rank from the House of Condé to the House of Orléans greatly aggravated

6322-554: A rival, however it was rumored at the time that one of the methods by which Marie Anne kept the interest of the king was to periodically offer him a ménage à trois with Diane Adélaïde. These widespread rumors made the sisters' visit to the King in Metz a national scandal and during their notorious visit the King suddenly fell gravely ill. Death appeared imminent, yet the King's chaplain refused him absolution unless he renounced his mistress, which he did. Marie Anne left The Court and after

6540-555: A scale in her left hand, and Athena , the symbol of wisdom, were placed in front of the facade on the Seine, along with statues of famous French royal ministers, Maximilien de Béthune, Duke of Sully , Jean-Baptiste Colbert , and Henri François d'Aguesseau , Poyet made two important modifications to the interior; he added two salons, the Salle des Gardes and the Salon de l'Empereur , which

6758-570: A secret agreement to exclude Stanislaus from the throne, and put forward another candidate, Augustus III , son of the deceased Polish king. The death of Augustus on 1 February 1733, with two heirs claiming the throne, sparked the War of the Polish Succession . Stanislaus traveled to Warsaw , where he was elected and crowned on 12 September. Empress Anna of Russia immediately marched her regiments into Poland to support her candidate. Stanislaus

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6976-514: A small squadron with two thousand soldiers, which after a fierce action was sunk by the Russians. On 3 July Stanislaus was forced to flee again, in disguise, to Prussia, where he became the guest of King Frederick William I of Prussia in the castle of Königsberg . To bring the war to an end, Fleury and Charles VI negotiated an ingenious diplomatic solution. Francis III, Duke of Lorraine , left Lorraine for Vienna, where he married Maria Theresa ,

7194-460: A special session by the President of the Republic. The 577 deputies, elected for five-year terms, are seated in the hemicycle, with the deputies of the socialists and other parties of the left seated to the left of the speaker, and those of the more conservative parties to the right. The President of the Assembly is seated in the Perchoir , or perch, a desk high up against the wall of the chamber, at

7412-406: A style she kept as a widow. She was Duchess of Bourbon and Princess of Condé by marriage. She was later a leading member of the cabale de Meudon , a group centered on her half-brother Louis, Grand Dauphin . While her son Louis Henri, Duke of Bourbon , was Prime Minister of France , she tried to further her political influence, but to little avail. Considered attractive, Louise Françoise had

7630-691: A territory from the St. Lawrence River to the Great Lakes and extending down the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys to Louisiana , compared with a population of one million settlers in the British 13 Colonies . To defend its territories, France had constructed Fort Duquesne to defend its frontier against the indigenous Americans; Britain sent the young George Washington with a small force to construct his own fortification, Fort Necessity , nearby. In 1754, after

7848-585: A turbulent love life and was frequently part of scandals during her father's reign. Later in life, she built the Palais Bourbon in Paris, the present seat of the National Assembly of France , with the fortune she amassed having invested greatly with John Law . Louise Françoise was born in Tournai on 1 June 1673 while her parents, King Louis XIV of France and Françoise-Athénaïs de Rochechouart were on

8066-629: Is by the American sculptor Walter De Maria . It was added in 1989 to commemorate the bicentennial of the French Revolution. The salle des Séances , or meeting chamber of the Palais Bourbon, has the same basic appearance and arrangement as it did in 1832. By the French Constitution, the Assembly is in session for nine months, from the beginning of October until the end of June, but the deputies can be summoned at any time for

8284-636: Is now called the Salon Delacroix. Another Salon, known as the Salon de la Paix or Salon des pas perdus, was decorated with allegories by Horace Vernet , illustrating two themes important to Louis Philippe; peace in Europe and the expansion of commerce and industry. They showed French ships carrying goods from the new French colonies in Africa, ships in the port of Marseille, the textile mills of Lyon, and

8502-528: The Palais Bourbon . In 1714, her niece, Mademoiselle du Maine , the daughter of her older brother, the Duke of Maine, was named in her honour. In the 1720s, Louise Françoise became the mistress of the Marquis de Lassay . In order to be closer to her, he built the Hôtel de Lassay next to the Palais Bourbon, her residence in Paris. Later on, a gallery was built, housing the grander, more public part of

8720-516: The Age of Enlightenment in France quietly began. On 15 June 1722, as Louis approached his thirteenth birthday, the year of his majority, he left Paris and moved back to Versailles, where he had happy memories of his childhood, but where he was far from the reach of public opinion. On 25 October, Louis was crowned King at the Cathedral of Reims . On 15 February 1723, the king's majority was declared by

8938-656: The Austrian Netherlands , won at the Battle of Fontenoy of 1745. He ceded New France in North America to Great Britain and Spain at the conclusion of the disastrous Seven Years' War in 1763. He incorporated the territories of the Duchy of Lorraine and the Corsican Republic into the Kingdom of France. Historians generally criticize his reign, citing how reports of his corruption embarrassed

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9156-627: The Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye in November 1674. The young Mademoiselle de Tours was legitimised in 1676 and would become a great friend of Louise Françoise. The death of her younger sister, in 1681, deeply affected her. After the death of Mademoiselle de Tours, Madame de Montespan wrote to the Duc du Maine : I do not speak to you of my grief, you are naturally too good not to have experienced it for yourself. As for Mademoiselle de Nantes, she has felt it as deeply as if she were twenty and has received

9374-559: The Château de Vincennes , before moving to the Tuileries Palace . In February 1717, when he had reached the age of seven, the King was taken away in tears from his beloved governess Madame Ventadour and placed in the care of François de Villeroy , the 73-year-old Duke and Maréchal de France , named as his governor in Louis XIV's will of August 1714. Villeroy instructed the young King in court etiquette, taught him how to review

9592-634: The Duchy of Lorraine , while another crossed the Alps and captured Milan on 3 November, handing it over to the King of Sardinia. Fleury was less energetic in his actions to restore the Polish throne to Stanislaus, who was blockaded by the Russian navy and army in Danzig. Instead of sending the largest part of the French fleet from its station off Copenhagen to Danzig, he ordered it to return to Brest and sent only

9810-498: The Duke of Anjou , was born in 1730 and died in 1733. Of the daughters only the two oldest daughters, who were fraternal twins, were raised at Versailles; the others were sent away to be raised at the Abbey of Fontevrault . Marie was a pious and timid Queen who spent most of her time secluded with her own courtiers. She was a musician, read extensively, and played social games with her courtiers. After 1737, she did not share her bed with

10028-574: The Duke of Noailles was defeated by a force of British, Hessian and Hanover soldiers led by George II at the Battle of Dettingen , and in September French forces were compelled to abandon Germany. In 1744, the Austrian Netherlands became the primary battlefield of the war, and the French position began to improve. Frederick the Great decided to rejoin the war on the French side. Louis XV left Versailles to lead his armies in

10246-463: The Dutch Republic , declared war on Spain. Spain was defeated on both land and sea, and quickly sought peace. A Franco-Spanish treaty was signed on 27 March 1721. The two governments proposed to unite their royal families by marrying Louis to his cousin, Mariana Victoria of Spain , the three-year-old daughter of Philip V of Spain , who was himself a grandson of Louis XIV. The marriage contract

10464-584: The French Revolution , and in May 1793 moved to the empty theater of the Tuileries Palace in Paris. The aristocracy fled into exile, and the Palais Bourbon and Hôtel de Lassay, like the Luxembourg Palace , Élysée Palace and Hôtel Matignon were nationalized, and used for government functions. The stables of the Palais became the headquarters of the administration of military transport, while

10682-588: The Hôtel de Lassay , on the west side of the Palais Bourbon; it is the official residence of the President of the National Assembly . The palace was built for Louise Françoise de Bourbon, Duchess of Bourbon (1673–1743), the legitimised daughter of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan . Begun in 1722 and finished in 1728, it was located in what was then a largely rural quarter at the edge of Paris, which

10900-421: The Left Bank in Paris Latin Quarter . Louise Françoise gave birth to nine children: Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (French: le Bien-Aimé ), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reached maturity (then defined as his 13th birthday) in 1723,

11118-400: The Parlement of Paris, the assembly composed of high nobles and wealthy Parisians who had purchased seats, it was rejected by a vote of one hundred and six to forty nine; the majority asked for more time to consider the project. The King responded by demanding immediate registration, which the Parlement reluctantly granted on 19 May. Resistance to the new measures grew with the church and in

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11336-421: The vingtième , a tax of five percent on net revenue, which, unlike the dixième , taxed the income of all French citizens, including for the first time the income from the property of the clergy and the nobility. While the new tax was supported by many, including Voltaire , it met immediate and fierce resistance from both the nobility and the church. When on 5 May 1749 it was presented for formal registration to

11554-401: The 18th-century artist Heim. The Salle des fêtes and the Galerie des tapisseries are located in the building that connects the Hotel de Lassay with the Palais Bourbon. The Salle des fêtes was built between 1846 and 1849, replacing an early wooden passage built in 1809. It is used today for expositions, ceremonies for visiting dignitaries, and the annual New Years greeting by the President of

11772-558: The Archbishop of Paris threatened to excommunicate any member of the Church who read the Jansenist journal, Nouvelles Ecclésiastiques . The Parlement was strictly forbidden to discuss religious questions, preventing them from opposing the Unigenitus bull. Priests who did not accept Unigenitus were denied the authority to administer last rites to the dying. A new tax, the cinquantième , was levied against religious figures who had previously been exempted from taxation. Jansenists and Protestants were threatened with prison and banishment. As

11990-410: The Assembly voted with patriotic enthusiasm for a war with Prussia, despite the opposition of a few deputies, including Adolphe Thiers , but in a matter of weeks the French army was defeated, the Emperor was captured, and on 2–3 September the French Third Republic was founded. After the defeat at Sedan, A provisional government of Parliament leaders was formed, and tried to continue the war, but Paris

12208-426: The Assembly. The Gallerie des tapisseries was created in 1860, during the Second Empire, to display a collection of paintings. The paintings were removed in 1865 and replaced in 1900 by a set of nine Beauvais tapestries. The Palais Bourbon contains several installations of contemporary art. One is a work of modern sculpture, a large granite sphere on a marble pedestal, by the American sculptor Walter De Maria , which

12426-419: The Austrian Netherlands. The King's defense of his action was practical: he did not want the Netherlands to be a permanent source of contention between France and other powers; he also felt that France had already reached its proper borders, and it was better to cultivate its prosperity rather than make it larger. His basis was also religious; he had been taught by Fleury that the Seventh Commandment forbade taking

12644-478: The Austrian ambassador in Paris to Madame de Pompadour for delivery to the King. She proposed a secret alliance between Austria and France, to meet the threats of the growing power of Prussia, which was still formally an ally of France, and Britain. In the New World, conflict had already begun between Great Britain and France. New France was at an enormous demographic disadvantage vis-à-vis its British counterparts; there were about 70,000 French colonists spread over

12862-563: The Banque Royal. It was mostly funded by the government, and was one of the earliest banks to issue paper money, which he promised could be exchanged for gold. He also persuaded wealthy Parisians to invest in the Mississippi Company , a scheme for the colonization of the French territory of Louisiana. The stock of the company first soared and then collapsed in 1720, taking the bank with it. Law fled France, and wealthy Parisians became reluctant to make further investments or trust any currency but gold. In 1719, France, in alliance with Britain and

13080-420: The Constitution to allow him to run for a second term, Louis Napoleon organized a coup d'état, took power, and had himself proclaimed Emperor Napoleon III, bringing an end to the Second Republic. Opposition deputies were arrested and exiled. The Assembly continued to meet in the Palais Bourbon, but had little influence over the Emperor or the government. They were not allowed to speak from the Tribune, but only from

13298-417: The Count of Toulouse, lived in the Hôtel de Toulouse . In 1733 her daughter Louise Élisabeth moved into a house very near the Palais Bourbon, which became another Hôtel de Conti (now the Hôtel de Brienne ), on the rue Saint-Dominique. Louise Françoise de Bourbon died on 16 June 1743, at the age of seventy, at the Palais Bourbon. She was buried at the Carmel du faubourg Saint-Jacques , a Carmelite convent on

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13516-424: The Dauphin, to whom she was close, allowed the couple to meet at his country estate at Meudon away from her husband and the court. Upon the death of her father-in-law on 1 April 1709, her husband succeeded to the title of Prince of Condé . He did not, however, succeed to his father's rank of Premier Prince du Sang , which was instead officially transferred from the House of Condé to the House of Orléans . As

13734-404: The Directory, featured a legislature with two houses, the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. The Palais Bourbon was formally returned to its aristocratic owner, the Prince of Condé, who had returned from exile. However, the building had been so modified it was impossible to use as a residence; the Prince rented a large part of the Palace to the new Chamber of Deputies. The first modification made by

13952-409: The Duke of Bourbon, the Duke was infuriated and began to undermine Fleury's position at court. When the King became aware of the Duke's intrigue, he abruptly dismissed him and replaced him with Fleury. From 1726 until his death in 1743, Fleury effectively ruled France with the king's assent. Fleury dictated the choices to be made, and encouraged the king's indecision and flattered his pride. He forbade

14170-433: The Duke of Noailles, showed the King a letter that Louis XIV had written to his grandson, Philip V of Spain ; it counseled: "Don't allow yourself to be governed; be the master. Never have a favorite or a prime minister. Listen, consult your Council, but decide yourself. God, who made you King, will give you all the guidance you need, as long as you have good intentions." Louis followed this advice and decided to govern without

14388-409: The Duke of Orléans, over which of the two should be declared Regent. After the Parlement of Paris had deliberated for a week, the Duke of Orléans was declared the official Regent . This of course exacerbated the rivalry between Louise Françoise and her younger sister, the Duchess of Orléans , now the highest ranking lady of France. During the Régence , Louise Françoise was frequently occupied with

14606-514: The Duke's own sisters Henriette Louise de Bourbon and Élisabeth Alexandrine de Bourbon . In the end, the 21-year-old Marie Leszczyńska , daughter of Stanislaus I , the deposed king of Poland, was chosen. The marriage was celebrated in September 1725 when the king was 15 and Marie was 22. Louis was said to have fallen in love with Marie instantly, and consummated his marriage to her seven times on their wedding night. From 1727 to 1737, Marie gave Louis XV ten children: eight girls and two boys. Of

14824-418: The Emperor entered for his annual address, was on the Seine, under the grand colonnade. Under the new plan, the main entrance was placed on the courtyard of honor, where a delegation of deputies met the new monarch, Louis-Philippe, when he came to the building each year to open the session. To give this entrance greater prominence, Joly constructed a neoclassical portico with four Corinthian columns, modeled after

15042-418: The Estates General in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame by Auguste Vinchon , and The Patriotic Devotion of the Bourgeois of Calais by Ary Scheffer . Next to the Salle des conférences is the Deputies Buffet, which was created in 1994 in the Belle Époque style and renovated in the same style in 1997. It is reserved exclusively for the use of current and former deputies. The adjacent Hôtel de Lassay, connected by

15260-445: The European stage, particularly Russia under Peter the Great and his successor, Catherine . The Habsburg monarchy under Charles VI was assembling a scattered but impressive empire as far as Serbia in southeastern Europe with territories taken from the Ottoman Empire , and from Spain, acquiring the Austrian Netherlands , Milan and the Kingdom of Naples . A new coalition against France began to assemble in eastern Europe, sealed by

15478-487: The French army in the German states along the Rhine. British naval supremacy prevented France from reinforcing its colonies overseas, and British naval squadrons raided the French coast at Cancale and Le Havre and landed on the Ile d'Aix and Le Havre. In 1759 the British attacked Martinique and Guadeloupe in the French West Indies , and captured Port Louis and Quebec . A series of French naval defeats forced Louis to abandon plans for invasion of Britain . In India,

15696-529: The French colony at Pondicherry was besieged by the British, and surrendered the following year. On 8 September 1760, Montreal surrendered, bringing to an end French rule in Canada. Martinique fell to the British in 1762. On 5 January 1757, as the King was getting into his carriage in the courtyard of the Grand Trianon Versailles, a demented man, Robert-François Damiens , pushed through

15914-513: The French in Germany. Maria Theresa's Hungarian army recaptured Linz and marched into Bavaria as far as Munich. In June, Frederick of Prussia withdrew from the alliance with France, after gaining the Duchies of Silesia from the Austrians. Belleville had to abandon Prague, with a loss of eight thousand men. For seven years, France was engaged in a costly war with constantly shifting alliances. Orry,

16132-518: The French nearly two to one, decisively defeated the army of the Prince de Soubise at the Battle of Rossbach . The new British Prime Minister, William Pitt , named a new commander, Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel , and the French armies were gradually pushed back to the Rhine, and defeated again at the Battle of Krefeld on 23 June. Thereafter, Britain and Prussia held the upper hand, tying down

16350-638: The Gallicans, theologians who wanted the Catholic Church in France to be distinctly French. The opposition to Unigenitus was particularly strong among the members of the Parlement of Paris , the assembly of the nobles. Despite the protests, on 24 March 1730 Cardinal Fleury persuaded the King to issue a decree that Unigenitus was the law of France as well as that of the Church. The government and church imposed repressive measures. On 27 April 1732,

16568-768: The Habsburg empire, or Louis's generals, who for a century had won glory fighting Austria. The King in Prussia had died on 31 May and was succeeded by his son Frederick the Great , a military genius with ambitions to expand Prussia's borders. The Elector Charles Albert of Bavaria, supported by Frederick, challenged the succession of Maria Theresa, and on 17 December 1740 Frederick invaded the Austrian province of Silesia . The elderly Cardinal Fleury had too little energy left to oppose this war. Fleury sent his highest ranking general, Charles Louis Auguste Fouquet, duc de Belle-Isle ,

16786-585: The Habsburgs since the early 16th century. As a result, the Ottoman Empire in 1740 renewed the French capitulations , which marked the supremacy of French trade in the Middle East. With these successes, Louis XV's prestige reached its highest point. In 1740 Frederick William I of Prussia declared "Since the Treaty of Vienna France is the arbiter of Europe." On 29 October 1740, a courier brought

17004-451: The Hôtel de Lassay in 1843. Joly once again was the architect chosen to redo the building; his plan called adding another story and restoring, as much as possible, the original italianate style, both inside and outside. The result was a building which was more intimate and elegant than its neoclassical neighbor. The work was begun in 1845, and was nearly finished when the 1848 French Revolution broke out. After days of turmoil and fighting,

17222-626: The Jansenists and the so-called "Gallicans" in Parlements of nobles. After the dismissal of 139 members of provincial parlements for opposing the official government and papal doctrine of Unigenitus , the Parlement of Paris had to register the Unigenitus papal bull and was forbidden to hear religious cases in the future. In the first years of his governance, Fleury and his foreign minister Germain Louis Chauvelin sought to maintain

17440-590: The King abdicated and departed France, and the Chamber of Deputies was dissolved, opening the way for the French Second Republic . Following the Revolution in February 1848, France and its legislature entered a turbulent period. The enormous painting of Louis Philippe taking his oath to the nation, over the tribune in the Chamber of Deputies was taken down, and replaced by a Gobelin tapestry of

17658-476: The King and Parlement was fought over the status of the Hôpital Général , a semi-religious organization which operated six different hospitals and shelters in Paris, with a staff of some five thousand persons. Many of the hospital staff and officials were Jansenists, while the board of directors of the hospital included many prominent members of the Parlement of Paris . In 1749, the King decided to purge

17876-486: The King by sentencing Damiens to the most severe possible penalty. On 28–29 March 1757 Damiens was executed on the Place de Grève in Paris by drawing and quartering, following which his body was burned on a bonfire. The house where he was born was burned down, his father, wife and daughter were banished from France, and his brothers and sisters were required to change their name. The King recovered physically very quickly, but

18094-651: The King left Versailles in order to take personal command of his armies fighting in the War of the Austrian Succession. This otherwise popular move was marred by the King's indiscreet decision to bring along Marie Anne. When Marie Anne visited the King in Metz in August 1744 she was accompanied by her sister Diane Adélaïde de Mailly . While an amiable companion, Marie Anne did not consider her simple sister to be much of

18312-419: The King recovered he made a triumphal entry into Paris. On 25 November, Minister Maurepas was obliged to recall Marie Anne to Versailles, but she soon fell sick with convulsive pains and died on 8 December 1744. Following her death the King consoled himself with Diane Adélaïde until he met Madame de Pompadour in 1745. The King's adultery confession, which was distributed publicly, embarrassed him and tarnished

18530-468: The King to go into mourning and for a time he turned to religion for consolation. When the King finally recovered his spirits, Louise Julie introduced the King to her youngest sister, Marie Anne de Mailly . The King was immediately attracted to Marie Anne, however she insisted that he expel her older sister from the Court before she would become his mistress. The King gave in, and on 4 October 1742, Marie Anne

18748-630: The King told him, "You see what a victory costs. The blood of our enemies is still the blood of men. The true glory is to spare it." Saxe went on to win further victories at Rocoux (1746) and Lauffeld (1747). In 1746 French forces besieged and occupied Brussels , which Louis entered in triumph. The King gave de Saxe the Chateau de Chambord in the Loire Valley as a reward for his victories. After Fleury's death in January 1743, his war minister,

18966-463: The King's guards and attacked the King, stabbing him in the side with a small knife. The King's guards seized Damiens, and the King ordered them to hold him but not harm him. The King walked up the steps to his rooms at the Trianon, where he found he was bleeding profusely. He summoned his doctor and a priest, and then fainted. Louis was saved from greater harm by the thickness of the winter clothing he

19184-455: The King. She was deeply upset by the death of her son the Dauphin in 1765, and died on 24 June 1768. One of the first serious conflicts that disturbed the early reign of Louis XV was a battle within the Catholic Church over a Papal Bull called Unigenitus . The Bull was requested by Louis XIV of Pope Clement XI and granted on 8 September 1713. It was a fierce condemnation of Jansenism ,

19402-682: The Maréchal de Belle-Isle, the grandson of Nicolas Fouquet , the famous disgraced controller of finances of Louis XIV, as his ambassador to the Diet of Frankfurt, with instructions to avoid a war by supporting the candidacy of the Elector of Bavaria to the Austrian throne. Instead, the Maréchal, who detested the Austrians, made an agreement to join with the Prussians against Austria, and the war began. French and Bavarian armies quickly captured Linz and laid siege to Prague . On 10 April 1741 Frederick won

19620-570: The Navy and household of the King, the Conte de Maurepas, was in office the entire period. In all he had just thirteen ministers over the course of nineteen years, while the King, in his last thirty-one years, employed forty-three. Louis's Controller-General of Finances Michel Robert Le Peletier des Forts (1726–1730), stabilized the French currency, though he was expelled for enriching himself in 1730. His successor, Philibert Orry , substantially reduced

19838-580: The Netherlands and in Italy, where Maréchal Belle-Isle was besieging the Austrians in Genoa. By the summer of 1747 France occupied the entire Austrian Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). In March 1748, Louis proposed a conference in Aix-la-Chapelle to bring the war to an end. The process was advanced by the capture of Maastricht by the Maréchal de Saxe on 10 April 1748. Britain, pressed by the threat of

20056-505: The Netherlands in person, and French field command was given to the German-born Maréchal Maurice de Saxe , a highly competent general. At the Battle of Fontenoy on 11 May 1745, Louis, accompanied by his young son the Dauphin, came under fire for the first time and witnessed a French victory over combined British, Dutch and Austrian forces. When the Dauphin became excited at the sight of so many dead enemy soldiers,

20274-649: The Palace of Justice, State Council and other government buildings, which were set afire in the last days of the Commune. While the French Senate returned to Paris soon after the suppression of the Commune, the Assembly remained in Versailles until 27 November 1879. The new Assembly of the Third Republic was considerably larger than that of early governments, with 531 deputies, compared with 260 under

20492-536: The Palais Bourbon and the Hôtel de Lassay were in the Italian style, with roofs hidden by balustrades and invisible from street level. The Palais Bourbon was in a U-shape. The main building was parallel to the Seine, with two wings enclosing a courtyard. The entrance to the courtyard and building was on the Rue de la Université. The entrance to the courtyard had an ornate archway, flanked by two pavilions. The Hôtel de Lassay

20710-476: The Palais Bourbon as the military court for the Luftwaffe , and it also housed the offices of the French bureau which sent French workers to factories in Germany. German propaganda banners decorated the Seine facade of the Palace. During the liberation of Paris in August 1944, parts of the Palace were badly damaged. A fire in the library started by the fighting destroyed twenty thousand books. Philippe de Gaulle ,

20928-616: The Palais Bourbon became in 1794 the Central School of Public Works, which later became, under Napoleon, the École Polytechnique , the famous military engineering school. In 1793 and 1794 the Revolution reached its peak of fury, under the Convention led by Robespierre and Saint-Just . The two leaders of the Terror were arrested and executed on 28 July 1794, and a new government, the Directory took power. On 23 September 1795

21146-475: The Palais Bourbon from the Place de la Concorde was blocked by the decoration of the bridge. The Council of Five Hundred began meeting on 21 January 1798, a date chosen because it was the anniversary of the execution of the "last tyrant", Louis XVI. The members arrived dressed in Roman togas and caps, in the neoclassical fashion. They found that the new Chamber had little ventilation, was feebly heated in winter, and

21364-401: The Parlement its droit de remontrance (right of remonstrance) – the right to challenge a king's decisions – which had been removed by Louis XIV. The droit de remontrance would impair the monarchy's functioning and marked the beginning of a conflict between the Parlement and King which contributed to the French Revolution in 1789. In the mean time, however, the will was annulled and Philippe

21582-547: The Parlement of Paris, officially ending the regency. Philippe continued to manage the government, and took the title of Prime Minister in August 1723, but while visiting his mistress, far from the court and medical care, he died in December of the same year. Following the advice of his preceptor Fleury, Louis XV appointed his cousin Louis Henri, Duke of Bourbon , to replace the late Duke of Orléans as prime minister. One of

21800-520: The Parlement, and the Parlement, without taking any action, went on vacation. On 20 November, when the Parlement returned, the King again summoned de Maupeou for an audience and again demanded action without delay. This time the Parlement members met but refused to discuss the Hospital. On 28 January 1752, the King instructed the Grand Council to change the administration of the Hospital without

22018-541: The People , it symbolises Youth, the Future and Hope. There are other notable contemporary works on display in the Palais Bourbon by Hervé Di Rosa , Djamel Tatah, Vincent Barré and Fabienne Verdier . 48°51′43″N 2°19′07″E  /  48.862036°N 2.318593°E  / 48.862036; 2.318593 Louise Fran%C3%A7oise de Bourbon Louise Françoise, Duchess of Bourbon (1 June 1673 – 16 June 1743)

22236-540: The Restoration. Work continued, despite the Revolution of 1830 that brought down the Bourbon Monarchy, and replaced it with a new Constitutional Monarchy. Louis Philippe , the new King, came to take the oath to the Chamber in its temporary meeting place. A second project, that of constructing a library, was commenced April 1831. The new interior was completed in September 1832, and formally inaugurated by

22454-526: The Revolution. The desk was brought from the Chateau of Versailles in 1794 during the Revolution for the use of the Committee of Public Safety. The Salon des Jeux is a conference room on the ground floor of the residence, where the President of the Assembly meets with other Assembly leaders to set the agenda for the sessions. It takes its name from an illustration over the door of a game of lawn bowling by

22672-584: The Second Empire. The new President of the Chamber, Léon Gambetta, called for a study and plan to enlarge the meeting space. A long series of enlargement plans were considered between 1879 and 1913, but none were ever approved. During the Third Republic, the Palais Bourbon was the home of the primary institution of the French government. The Assembly selected the President of France, and controlled finances and foreign policy. Its membership divided between constitutional monarchists and conservatives, who sat to

22890-542: The Seine into a suitable meeting chamber. The chamber they designed was in the shape of a hemicycle, similar to a Roman theater. it was covered with a cupola modeled after that of the amphitheater of the Academy of Surgery, located not far away in Saint-Germain-des-Pres, which had been built between 1769 and 1774. The first session of the Council took place on 21 January 1798. It was quickly discovered that

23108-461: The acoustics of the new chamber were poor. A few other changes were made to the Palace; a vestibule and rotunda was added on the courtyard, and a wooden gallery was constructed to connect the Palace with the Hotel de Lassay. Two features of the original chamber can still be found in the new New Chamber; the desk and armchair of the President of the Assembly, made of wood and gilded bronze, designed in

23326-493: The acoustics were made it hard to hear the speakers. The acoustics in the end made little difference, because on 8 November 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte organized a coup d'état and seized power from the Council of Five Hundred, then meeting at the Chateau of Saint-Cloud. Napoleon formed a new legislature, the Corps Legislatif , whose only duty was to listen to an annual speech by Napoleon, the new First Consul, and to adopt

23544-502: The age of five, trembling and crying and against all probability, inherited the throne as Louis XV. According to Charles V's royal ordinance of 1374 the Kingdom of France must be governed by a regent until a given king had reached the age of 13. The title of regent was customarily assigned to an under-aged king's nearest adult living relative, often his mother or an uncle. But as Louis's mother had been struck down by disease, and as his only uncle had already been enthroned as King of Spain,

23762-471: The ancestral home of George II . However, the best French commander, Maurice de Saxe , had died two years after the War of the Austrian Succession , and his successors, the Prince de Soubise , the Duke D'Estrees and the Duke de Broglie detested each other, and were rarely willing to cooperate. In August Frederick of Prussia made a lightning strike into Saxony and on 5 November 1757, though outnumbered by

23980-416: The ancient Roman baths. with pillars supporting five cupolas, which provide light. It is closed at either end by curved bays. The decoration, by Eugène Delacroix and a team of assistants, was done between 1838 and 1847. The paintings on the ceiling around each of the cupolas represents a different branch of human knowledge; poetry; theology, legislation, philosophy and the sciences. The stories that illustrate

24198-469: The ancient Roman temple of Jupiter Stator. Joly's project greatly increased the interior space of the building, adding three new salons (now the Salons Delacroix, Casimir-Pierier, Abel-de-Pujol. Under the new plan, it was possible to go from one wing of the building to the other without having to cross the courtyard or pass through the meeting chamber. In 1837 a new project was begun to finish

24416-449: The approval of the Parlement . Voltaire, describing the affair, wrote, "Never before has such a small affair caused such a great emotion of the spirit." It was the first overt disobedience of the legislature against the King, and one of the first signs that the Parlement believed it, not the King, was the legitimate source of laws in the nation. The King's original plans to tax the church also ran into difficulty. A royal decree ordered all

24634-456: The arts, as well as religious establishments. She remained close to the King until her death in 1764. He was devastated, and remained in seclusion for several weeks after she died. The peace achieved by Louis with the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle lasted only seven years. At the end of August 1755, Marie Therese , the Empress of Austria, discreetly wrote a letter to Louis XV, which was passed by

24852-423: The attack had a depressive effect on his spirits. One of his chief courtiers, Duford de Cheverny, wrote afterwards: "it was easy to see that when members of the court congratulated him on his recovery, he replied, 'yes, the body is going well', but touched his head and said, 'but this goes badly, and this is impossible to heal.'" After the assassination attempt, the King invited his heir, the Dauphin, to attend all of

25070-515: The boys, only the elder, the Dauphin Louis (1729–1765), survived childhood. While he did not live to rule, his birth as the awaited heir was welcomed with celebration in all spheres of French society. (The Dauphin Louis would go on to marry Maria Josephina of Saxony in 1747, who gave birth to the next three Kings of France: Louis XVI , Louis XVIII , and Charles X ). Louis XV's second son,

25288-574: The chief architect in 1726 and is given credit for the definitive design. Jacques Gabriel acted as a consultant. The Palais had a collection of large reception rooms, the main one being the Galerie which overlooked the Seine ; the main salon of the Palais looked towards the Tuileries Palace to the east. The Palais was linked to the Hôtel de Lassay by means of a corridor overlooking a joint Parterre . Her older half-sister, Marie Anne de Bourbon , who

25506-415: The chief architect of Louis XIV. The Italian architect Lorenzo Giardini made the first plan, but he died in 1722, having made little but the first sketches. The project was taken over by Pierre Cailleteau , also known as Lassurance, who had been an assistant to Hardouin-Mansart. Cailleteau had worked on the palace of Versailles and Les Invalides , and he knew the royal style very well, but he died in 1724. He

25724-416: The clergy to submit a declaration of their revenue by 17 February 1751, but that day passed without any declarations given. Instead it became known that the King had quietly issued a new decree in December 1750, canceling the tax and relying again, entirely, on the " don gratuit ", the voluntary donation by the church of 1,500,000 livres. Under the new decree, instead of a tax, the church would each year collect

25942-497: The collection of paintings that made Lassay's reputation as a connoisseur redound in Parisian circles for a generation after his death; the gallery that joined the two buildings also enabled the lovers to have better access to each other. In 1737, she was asked to be the godmother to Louis XV's eldest son, Louis, Dauphin of France . The young dauphin's godfather was Louise Françoise's nephew, Louis, Duke of Orléans . When her son

26160-513: The debt caused by the War of the Spanish Succession, and simplified and made more fair the tax system, though he still had to depend upon the unpopular dixieme , or tax of the tenth of the revenue of every citizen. Orry managed, in the last two years of Fleury's government, to balance the royal budget, an accomplishment never again repeated during the rest of the reign. Fleury's government expanded commerce, both within France and with

26378-527: The east side of the Hemicycle, where the Deputies can read, talk and check their messages. It was originally the dining room of the Prince de Condé and was transformed in 1830 into its present use. The ceiling is richly decorated with paintings by Heim on the history of the monarchy and parliaments and on by the fireplace are large historical paintings on parliamentary subjects; Philip le Bel Brings assembles

26596-543: The escapades of her second daughter, Louise Élisabeth, Princess of Conti, who had become the mistress of Philippe Charles de La Fare . When her daughter's husband, the Prince of Conti , discovered the liaison, he became physically abusive toward his wife. The only son of the Conti couple, Louis François de Bourbon , was thought to have been the result of his mother's adulterous relationship with La Fare. Louise Élisabeth later took refuge from her violent husband with her mother at

26814-534: The eternal object of jealousy." Louis lacked the communicative skills to explain his decision to the French public, and further, did not see any need to do so. The news that the King had returned the Southern Netherlands to Austria was met with disbelief and bitterness. The French obtained so little of what they had fought for that they adopted the expressions Bête comme la paix ("Stupid as the peace") and Travailler pour le roi de Prusse ("To work for

27032-554: The example of Louis XIV, Villeroy had the young Louis dance in public in two ballets—once at the Tuileries Palace on 24 February 1720, and then again in The Ballet des Elements on 31 December 1721. The shy Louis was terrified of these performances, and never danced in another ballet. The King's tutor was the Abbé André-Hercule de Fleury , the bishop of Fréjus (and later to become Cardinal de Fleury), who saw that he

27250-534: The exterior decoration, particularly on the facade facing the Seine. The original three bas-reliefs on the facade beneath the colonnade had been removed with the fall of the Empire, and were not replaced; but two new works replaced other Napoleonic bas reliefs; Prometheus animating the arts by Rude and Public Education by James Pradier . The bas-relief on the Fronton, which had originally depicted Napoleon bringing

27468-607: The facade featured bas-reliefs by sculptor Antoine-Denis Chaudet, showed scenes from the opening of the Corps Legislative in 1806; it showed Napoleon on horseback, offering to the members of the Legislature the flags which had been captured from the Austrians at the Battle of Austerlitz , and the inscription, "To Napoleon I the Great – the Corps Legislatif". In 1810, statues of the goddess Themis , holding

27686-755: The first complete and accurate map of France, the Cartes de Cassini. Besides his academic studies, he received a practical education in government. Beginning in 1720 he attended the regular meetings of the Regency Council. One economic crisis disrupted the Regency; the Scottish economist and banker John Law was named controller-general of finances. In May 1716, he opened the Banque Générale Privée ("General Private Bank"), which soon became

27904-466: The first microphones for speakers, but featured a large number of political parties and unstable coalitions which frequently collapsed. The Algerian Crisis of 1956 brought an end to the Fourth Republic, the approval of a new Constitution, and the adoption of the still-existing Fifth Republic . The Court of Honor, to the south of the Palais, has been the main entrance since the original palace

28122-502: The first priorities of the Duke of Bourbon was to find a bride for the King, to assure the continuity of the monarchy, and especially to prevent the succession to the throne of the Orléans branch of the family, the rivals of his branch. A list of 99 princesses was prepared, among them being Princess Anne of Great Britain , Barbara of Portugal , Princess Charlotte Amalie of Denmark , Elisabeth Therese of Lorraine , Enrichetta d'Este and

28340-511: The flags of Austerlitz to the Assembly, was replaced by a new work by Corton entitled France supported by Force and Justice . For the new entry portico on the court of honor, Joly commissioned two new statues by Gayard; titled France and Liberty . These two statues were not installed until 1860, under Napoleon III, and were given new names; "Force" and France deposits her ballot in the voting urn. The interior minister of Louis-Philippe, and future President of France, Adolphe Thiers , oversaw

28558-535: The floor of the Chamber. After 1860, the Emperor liberalized the regime, giving the deputies greater influence, freedom of speech and the press was reestablished, and debates resumed in the Palais Bourbon. On 31 May 1861 the halls resounded to a musical and theatrical evening from the Bouffes Parisiens company which included the premiere of Offenbach's M. Choufleuri restera chez lui le . . . . In 1870,

28776-479: The following November after having caught her illness. Louise Françoise and her husband eventually had nine children, all of whom survived into adulthood. After her mother officially left court in 1691, Louise Françoise would visit her at the convent of the Filles de Saint-Joseph , in the rue Saint-Dominique in Paris, where she had retired. As they saw each other often, the two became much closer, and Louise Françoise

28994-461: The future king's mother, Marie Adélaïde, who had been stricken with measles , died, followed six days later by Louis's father, her devoted husband who would not leave her side during her illness. With the death of both the Grand and Petit dauphins, Louis's elder brother immediately became Dauphin of France , but just over two weeks further still, on 7 March, it was found that both the elder Louis and

29212-534: The gallery in 1890. The Assembly declared war in 1914 and celebrated victory in 1918, but was badly divided in the 1930s and was unable to manage the economic crisis and the approach of World War II. In June 1940, as the German army approached the capital, the government and Assembly abandoned Paris and moved first to Tours; then to Bordeaux; and then, under the Pétain Government, to Vichy. The Germans used

29430-412: The hall; an ellipse, rectangle, octagon and hemicycle, but the Chamber decided to keep the original hemicycle. De Joly also was asked to redesign the three salons which faced on the courtyard of honor. The plan was submitted in January 1828, approved in April 1829, the first stone placed on 4 November 1829. Over three hundred workers were engaged on the project, one of the largest undertaken in Paris during

29648-426: The height of the highest back row, symbolizing that the President is a deputy like the others. The armchair was designed by Jacques-Louis David for the Council of Five Hundred, the first legislature to meet in the building. Deputies vote electronically by pushing a button, and the count is displayed at the front of the Chamber. The sessions of the Chamber are open to the public though access must be requested through

29866-529: The heir presumptive to the Habsburg thrones. The vacant throne of Lorraine was to be occupied by Stanislaus, who abandoned his claim to the Polish throne. Upon the death of Stanislaus, the Duchy of Lorraine and Bar would become part of France. Francis, as the future emperor, would be compensated for the loss of Lorraine by the granting of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany . The King of Sardinia would be compensated with certain territories in Lombardy. The marriage of Francis of Lorraine and Maria Theresa took place in 1736, and

30084-408: The hospital of Jansenists and corruption, appointed a new "Supérieure" against the will of the administrators, who resigned, then appointed four temporary administrators, and asked the First President of the Parlement of Paris, René Nicolas Charles Augustin de Maupeou , to implement his decree for the reorganization of the hospital. De Maupeou refused to carry out the decree without the authorization of

30302-423: The interior decoration of the Assembly. He selected a promising young painter Eugène Delacroix , just 25 years old, to paint murals for the Salon of the King ( Salon du Roi ), though the King, Louis-Philippe, in fact detested Delacroix's style. Between 1833 and 1838 Delacroix created a series of allegorical figures representing Justice, Truth, Prudence, War, Industry, and Agriculture. The murals are preserved in what

30520-419: The interior of the house had many small salons which could be arranged for a variety of purposes. It also had a novelty for buildings of the period; corridors, so one could pass through the building without walking through the rooms. None of the original apartments of the Duchess survive; they were demolished in the subsequent remodelings. The Duchesse de Bourbon died in 1743, and De Lassay died in 1750. The Palace

30738-454: The job fell to his great-uncle Philippe II, Duke of Orléans . However Louis XIV had distrusted Philippe, who was a renowned soldier but was regarded by the late King as an atheist and libertine. The King referred privately to Philippe as a Fanfaron des crimes ("braggart of crimes"). Louis XIV had desired for France to be ruled by his favorite but illegitimate son, the Duke of Maine (illegitimate son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan ), who

30956-403: The killing of French envoy, Joseph Coulon de Jumonville , the French sent reinforcements and compelled Washington and his men to withdraw. The undeclared French and Indian War followed, with British and French colonies in North America engaging in open conflict. By the end of 1755, British ships had captured over 300 French merchantmen. In January 1756, Louis sent an ultimatum to London, which

31174-512: The king of Prussia", i.e. working for nothing). Louis had been very much in love with the Queen, and they were inseparable in the early years of his reign, but as his family grew, and the Queen was constantly pregnant or exhausted by her maternities, he began to look elsewhere. He first became attached to one of the ladies of the Queen's court, Louise Julie de Mailly , who was the same age as he and from an ancient noble family. Without courtship or ceremony, he made her his mistress, and raised her to

31392-426: The king to discuss politics with the Queen. In order to save on court expenses, he sent the youngest four daughters of the king to be educated at the Abbey of Fontevrault. On the surface it was the most peaceful and prosperous period of the reign of Louis XV, but it was built upon a growing volcano of opposition, particularly from the noble members of the Parlements, who saw their privileges and power reduced. Fleury made

31610-406: The king's mistresses were widely distributed and read. Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson , better known as Madame de Pompadour, was the most famous and influential of the mistresses of Louis XV. She was the illegitimate daughter of a Paris fermier-general , and was married to a banker, Charles Guillaume Lenormant d'Étoiles . She was noticed by the King following one of his hunts, and formally met him at

31828-442: The kingdom was ruled by his grand-uncle Philippe II, Duke of Orléans , as Regent of France . Cardinal Fleury was chief minister from 1726 until his death in 1743, at which time the king took sole control of the kingdom. His reign of almost 59 years (from 1715 to 1774) was the second longest in the history of France, exceeded only by his predecessor, Louis XIV, who had ruled for 72 years (from 1643 to 1715). In 1748, Louis returned

32046-418: The laws proposed by the Council of State, and debated by another new body, the Tribunat . While Napoleon gave the new legislature little power, he did give their building a new grandeur. In 1806 the Bureau of the Corps Legislatif proposed the construction of a new facade facing the Seine, which would be aligned with and would match that of the Temple of Glory (now the Church of the Madeleine ) which Napoleon

32264-409: The monarchy, while his wars drained the treasury and produced little gain. However, a minority of scholars argue that he was popular during his lifetime, but that his reputation was later blackened by revolutionary propaganda. His grandson and successor Louis XVI inherited a large kingdom in need of financial and political reform which would ultimately lead to the French Revolution of 1789. Louis XV

32482-435: The new dauphine's condescending attitude toward ladies of inferior rank. The Duchess of Orléans and the older Dowager Princess of Conti also grew to dislike their niece for her haughty behavior. As a dowager, Louise Françoise became a good friend of Jeanne Baptiste d'Albert de Luynes , the former mistress of Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy . Jeanne Baptiste had escaped Savoy in 1700 and had been residing in Paris ever since. She

32700-416: The new government, in July, 1815, just a month after Napoleon's final defeat at Waterloo, was to erase the inscription to Napoleon, the five bas-reliefs and the numerous Ns and eagles that had been carved on the facades. The bas-relief featuring Napoleon on tn the Seine facade was replaced by a plaster bas relief by Alexandre-Évariste Fragonard of Louis XVIII signing the Charter of 1814, the founding document of

32918-459: The new government. The Chamber of Deputies continued to rent the space until 1827, when it finally bought the building from the heir of the Prince of Condé in 1827, for 5,250,000 francs. The meeting hall was in deplorable condition, so the Chamber decided on a major renovation. The architect Jules de Joly (1788–1865) who had been official architect of the Chamber since 1821, was selected for the task. The architect proposed four possible new shapes for

33136-417: The new monarch on 19 November 1832. The meeting hall of the Deputies kept the same hemicycle form, but the floor was lowered, giving greater height to the ceiling, and increasing the height of the tribune and the desk of the President. A colonnade and balconies, in the form of an arch of triumph, was constructed behind the tribune, giving the appearance of a theatrical stage. The central panel above and behind

33354-445: The news to the King, who was hunting in Fontainebleau, that the Emperor Charles VI was dead, and his daughter Maria Theresa was set to succeed him. After two days of reflection, Louis declared, "In these circumstances, I don't want to get involved at all. I will remain with my hands in my pockets, unless of course they want to elect a Protestant emperor." This attitude did not please France's allies, who saw an opportunity to take parts of

33572-417: The next eight years. Philippe saw the trap. The Parlement of Paris , an assembly of French nobles among whom Philippe had many friends, was the only judicial body in France with the authority to have this portion of the deceased King's will annulled, and immediately after the King's death Philippe approached the Parlement requesting that they do just this. In exchange for their support he agreed to restore to

33790-469: The nobility, the densely-populated Marais, so the aristocracy of the Regency looked for land with space for gardens at the edges of the city, either near the Champs-Élysées on the right bank or on the left bank. The Duchess of Bourbon had been known for frivolity at the Court in Versailles, but by the 1720s, she had had seven children and was widowed. The reputed lover of the Duchess, Armand de Madaillan de Lesparre, Count of Lassy ( Comte de Lassay ), proposed

34008-399: The office of a deputy. The sessions are also transmitted live on the Internet site of the Assembly. The salons of the Palais Bourbon were created during the reign of Louis-Philippe and were decorated by prominent artists, most notably Eugène Delacroix . The Library was built beginning in 1830 against the side of the original Palais. The design is architect Jules de Joly, in the style of

34226-433: The other exchanges took place in turn. With the death of Stanislaus in 1766, Lorraine and the neighboring Duchy of Bar became part of France. In September 1739, Fleury scored another diplomatic success. France's mediation in the war between the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire led to the Treaty of Belgrade (September 1739), which favoured the Ottoman Empire, beneficiary of a Franco-Ottoman alliance against

34444-425: The painting of Raphael, The School of Athens , made between 1683 and 1688. The Chamber of Deputies elected in 1846 was abruptly disbanded by the February Revolution. A new election by direct universal suffrage chose a Constituent Assembly. The Constituent Assembly met for the first time in the temporary chamber which had been constructed in the garden of the Palais Bourbon, and the on 4 May the French Second Republic

34662-525: The papal doctrine Unigenitus part of French law and forbade any debate in Parlement, which caused the silent opposition to grow. He also downplayed the importance of the French Navy, which would prove be a fatal mistake in future conflicts. Fleury showed the King the virtues of a stable government; he kept the same Minister of War, Bauyn d'Angervilliers, and controller of the currency, Philibert Orry , for twelve years, and his minister of foreign affairs, Germain Louis Chauvelin , for ten years. His minister of

34880-417: The peace by maintaining the French alliance with Great Britain, despite their colonial rivalry in North America and the West Indies . They also rebuilt the alliance with Spain, which had been shaken by the anger of the Spanish King when Louis refused to marry the Spanish infanta . The birth of the king's male heir in 1729 dispelled the risks of a succession crisis in France. However, new powers were emerging on

35098-407: The prestige of the monarchy. Although Louis XV's recovery earned him the epithet "well-beloved" from a public relieved by his survival, the events at Metz diminished his standing. The military successes of the War of the Austrian Succession inclined the French public to overlook Louis' adulteries, but after 1748, in the wake of the anger over the terms of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, pamphlets against

35316-439: The project, including for Jacques-Germain Soufflot , Bellisard and Charpentier. For the neoclassical palace of the Prince, the entrance on rue Université was replaced by a larger and more impressive gate, framed by a gallery of columns. The two wings of the building were extended, and a pavilion was created with apartments for one of his sons. An abundance of military decoration, including stucco sculptures of shields and weapons,

35534-430: The property of others by fraud or violence. Louis often cited a Latin maxim declaring, "if anyone who asks by what means he can best defend a kingdom, the answer is, by never wishing to augment it." He also received support from Voltaire, who wrote, "It seems better, and even more useful for the court of France to think about the happiness of its allies, rather than to be given two or three Flemish towns which would have been

35752-403: The provinces, which had their own parlements . While the Parlements of Burgundy, Provence and Artois bowed to the King's demands, Brittany and Languedoc refused. The royal government closed down the Parlement of Brittany, ordered the members of the Parlement of Languedoc to return to their estates and parishes, and took direct control of the Provence. Within Paris, the battle between

35970-450: The rank of Duchess. The Duke of Luynes commented on the King's behavior: "The King loves women, and yet there is absolutely no gallantry in his spirit." In 1738, after the Queen lost an unborn child, her doctors forbade her to have relations with the King for a time. The King was offended by her refusal and thereafter never shared her bed. Acknowledging that he was committing adultery, Louis refused thereafter to go to confession and to take

36188-446: The residences of her surviving siblings. Named after her family, it was built after her stay at the Grand Trianon , which became the architectural inspiration for her new home. Construction on the palace started in 1722, when she was forty-nine years old. Several designers were involved, including Robert de Cotte , who drew up plans around 1720, Lorenzo Giardini, who died in 1722, and Lassurance , who died in 1724. Jean Aubert became

36406-612: The rest of the world. Transportation and shipping were improved with the completion of the Saint-Quentin canal (linking the Oise and Somme rivers) in 1738, which was later extended to the Escaut River and the Low Countries , and the systematic building of a national road network. By the middle of the 18th century, France had the most modern and extensive road network in the world. The Council of Commerce stimulated trade, and French foreign maritime trade increased from 80 to 308 million livres between 1716 and 1748. The Government continued its policy of religious repression, aimed at

36624-435: The right of the Chamber as seen from the podium, and the moderate and radical republicans and later socialists, who sat to the left. The chamber saw many eloquent and spirited debates between the leaders of the parties, and sometimes turmoil. In 1898, during the Dreyfus affair , the socialist leader Jean Jaurès was struck by a monarchist deputy while giving a speech in the Chamber, and a bomb placed by an anarchist exploded in

36842-461: The rivalry between Louise Françoise and her younger sister. Louise Françoise's husband, who had by this time descended into madness, did not survive his father long and died within the year in 1710. Although Louise Françoise should have officially assumed the style of Madame la Princesse de Condé douairière (Dowager Princess of Condé) upon the death of her husband, she instead chose to be known in her widowhood as Madame la Duchesse douairière. She had

37060-404: The room represent Orpheus bringing the benefits of the arts and civilization and Attila and his barbarian hordes at the feet of Italy and the Arts. The original collection of the library was assembled from books confiscated from the libraries of the clergy and aristocracy who left Paris during the Revolution. It also includes many rare items donated to the Assembly, including the minutes of

37278-565: The sacrament. The Cardinal de Fleury tried to persuade him to confess and to give up his mistress, but without success. In 1738, the King turned his attentions to the sister of Louise Julie, Pauline Félicité de Mailly . Pauline Félicité became pregnant in 1740, allegedly by the King, and subsequently died during childbirth (The illegitimate son of the King and Pauline Félicité came to be known as "Demi-Louis" due to his visual resemblance to his father who took care of his financial needs but gave him little attention.). Pauline Félicité's death caused

37496-409: The site of the palace to her; he had purchased land next door along the Seine, and the two buildings were constructed at the same time. The parcel of land for the new palace was large, extending from the Seine to the rue de l'Université . The original plan called for a country residence surrounded by gardens, modeled after the Grand Trianon palace at Versailles, designed by Jules Hardouin Mansart ,

37714-418: The son of Charles de Gaulle , was sent from Montparnasse Station on 25 August 1944 with orders for the Germans troops entrenched within National Assembly at the Palais Bourbon to surrender. Despite the risk of being killed alone and unarmed, he negotiated their surrender. The Fourth Republic was founded by the adoption of a new Constitution in 1946 and brought new technology to the Palais Bourbon, including

37932-411: The superintendent of French finance, was forced to reinstate the highly unpopular dixieme tax to fund the war. Cardinal de Fleury did not live to see the end of the conflict; he died on 29 January 1743, and thereafter Louis ruled alone. The war in Germany was not going well; the French and Bavarian forces were faced with the combined armies of Austria, Saxony, Holland, Sardinia and Hanover. The army of

38150-463: The territories he had conquered in the Netherlands to the Austrians, Maastricht to the Dutch, Nice and Savoy to the Sardinians, and Madras in India to the English. The Austrians would give the Duchy of Parma and some other territory to the Spanish Infante , Philip , while Britain would return to France Louisbourg and the island of Cape Breton . France also agreed to expel the Stuart pretender Charles Edward Stuart from its territory. The end of

38368-407: The themes were taken from antiquity, rather than from French history. They represent the great thinkers ( Ovid , Demosthenes , Herodotus , and Aristotle , as well as scenes representing the dangers to democracy and civilization; the death of Saint John the Baptist , the death of Seneca the Younger , and the murder of Archimedes by a Roman soldier. The large paintings on the bays at either end of

38586-407: The three sisters were intensely jealous of each other. Louise Françoise and Françoise Marie were especially competitive, despising any increase in status or rank that the other, or any of her children, might achieve. Louise Françoise was, however, close to her half-brother Louis, Grand Dauphin . Having inherited her parents' passion for music and dance, Louise Françoise became a good dancer. When she

38804-536: The time of their legitimisation, her eldest brother, Louis-Auguste de Bourbon , received the title of Duke of Maine ; her next eldest brother, Louis-César de Bourbon , became the Count of Vexin , while Louise Françoise received the courtesy title of Mademoiselle de Nantes. Her parents had nicknamed her Poupotte after her doll-like appearance. In the year after her birth, another sibling joined Louis-Auguste, Louis-César, and Louise Françoise at their residence in Paris. The future Mademoiselle de Tours had been born at

39022-422: The trial of Joan of Arc , the manuscripts of Jean-Jacques Rousseau , donated by his widow in 1794, and the Codex Borbonicus , an Aztec codex written by Aztec priests shortly before or after the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire . The library is reserved for he use of the members of the Assembly and their staffs and is not open to the public. The Salle des Conférences is a large room with tables and lamps on

39240-416: The tribune was occupied by a large painting of Louis-Philippe taking his oath before the Assembly. Niches were constructed on either side of the tribune, with statues of "Liberty" and "Public Order" by Pradet . The four columns of the arch were decorated with statues representing Force, Justice, Prudence and Eloquence. The plan by Joly also turned the building around. Under Napoleon, the main entrance, where

39458-464: The visits of the Queen and Madame la Dauphine The Mesdemoiselles of Nantes and of Tours had been raised together in a private house on the Rue de Vaugirard in Paris, where the king's illegitimate children with Madame de Montespan had been hidden away from the prying eyes of the court by their parents. Louise Françoise would never be close to either her older half-sister, Marie Anne de Bourbon , or younger full sister, Françoise Marie de Bourbon , as

39676-401: The war had caused celebration in Paris, but the publication of the details of the treaty on 14 January 1749 caused dismay and anger. The Stuart pretender Charles Edward Stuart refused to leave Paris and was acclaimed by the Parisians. He was finally arrested on 10 December 1748, and transported by force to Switzerland. The French military commanders, including de Saxe, were furious about giving up

39894-416: The words of the poet Jean Tardieu : "Men search for the light in a fragile garden where the colors tremble." The Salon of Marianne, created in 2004, displays busts of Marianne, the symbol of the Republic from different periods and in different styles. It has displayed since 2015 a work by the American graffiti artist JonOne , called Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité . Based on Delacroix's famous Liberty Leading

40112-516: The younger Louis had also contracted measles. The two brothers were treated in the traditional way, with bloodletting . On the night of 8–9 March, the new Dauphin, age five, died from the combination of the disease and the treatment. The governess of Louis, Madame de Ventadour , forbade the doctors to bleed the two year old Duke of Anjou by hiding him in a palace closet where she cared for him alone; where he survived despite being very ill. When Louis XIV himself finally died on 1 September 1715, Louis, at

40330-401: Was a great literary figure of the day. Within two years, in 1712, the new dauphin and his young wife died, leaving only a small son, the duc d'Anjou , as the legitimate heir of Louis XIV. In 1715, the king died, and was succeeded by his five-year-old great-grandson, Louis XV . A controversy immediately arose between Louise Françoise's older brother, the Duke of Maine, and her brother-in-law,

40548-414: Was about to become a very fashionable residential neighborhood, the Faubourg Saint-Germain. Until that time, the area, called the Pré-au-Clercs, was a wooded area popular for fighting duels. After the death of Louis XIV in 1715, following the example of the Regent, the aristocracy began to move their residences from Versailles back to Paris. Building-space land was scarce in the traditional residential area of

40766-413: Was added to the vestibule, and are still visible today. The palace was only finished at the end of the 1780s, when the French Revolution swept away the old regime. The Prince went into exile, and the two residences were confiscated by the state in 1792. The first French national assembly gathered without royal authorization on 20 June 1789 in the tennis court of the Palace of Versailles. the first step of

40984-446: Was addressed as Monsieur le Duc . As a result, his new wife became known as Madame la Duchesse . Some time after her marriage in 1686, while the court was in residence at the Palace of Fontainebleau , Louise Françoise contracted smallpox. While her then seventeen-year-old husband did not help nurse her back to health, her mother and grandfather-in-law, Le Grand Condé , did. Louise Françoise recovered, but Le Grand Condé died

41202-417: Was also called the.. prettiest, wittiest, and naughtiest of the fast set in the latter half of the reign, and was in constant hot water. Her comic verse, too often indecent, was genuinely amusing, except to the victims, and the king was not at all amused at a set which she had written on his august self On 25 May 1685, at the age of eleven, Louise Françoise was married to Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Bourbon ,

41420-415: Was approved by the King and presented in two decrees issued in May 1749. The first measure was an issue of bonds, paying five percent interest, to pay off the 36 million livres of debt caused by the cost of the war. This new measure was an immediate success. The second measure was the abolition of the dixième , a tax of ten percent of revenue, which had been created to finance the war, and its replacement by

41638-403: Was bequeathed to him, but he rarely used it. In 1692, her youngest sister, Françoise Marie, was married to their first cousin, Philippe d'Orléans , the only son and heir of their uncle, Monsieur . As the wife of a petit-fils de France , Françoise Marie took precedence at court over Louise Françoise and their half-sister Marie Anne. This, combined with the fact that Françoise Marie received

41856-412: Was building at the end of Rue Royale , to the north of the Place de la Concorde. The new neoclassical facade, designed by architect Bernard Poyet , had twelve corinthian columns in an entirely different style from Italianate 18th century palace behind it, but it was high enough to be visible from the Place de la Concorde and was correctly aligned to be visible from the Madeleine. The original fronton of

42074-399: Was constructed. It was considerably modified in the 1830s, with the addition of the ceremonial portico over the doorway, but still retains its original outlines. The sculptures on either side of the entrance represent Universal Suffrage and the Law. They were added during the Second Empire in 1860. The granite ball on a pedestal in the centre of the courtyard, called the Sphere of Human Rights,

42292-474: Was deeply affected by her mother's death in 1707. Louis XIV forbade anyone at court to wear mourning clothes for his former mistress, but, as a mark of respect for their mother, Louise Françoise and her two younger siblings, Françoise Marie de Bourbon and the Count of Toulouse , decided not to attend any court gatherings. On the other hand, her older brother, the Duke of Maine , could barely conceal his joy at inheriting his mother's fortune. The Château de Clagny

42510-403: Was disgraced during the Regency of Philippe d'Orléans , Louise Françoise regarded his mistress Madame de Prie as the cause. As such, Louise Françoise detested her. Her son died in exile in 1740 to be succeeded by his son, Louise Françoise's grandson, Louis Joseph, Prince of Condé , who was aged four. During her long widowhood, Louise Françoise built the Palais Bourbon in Paris, not far from

42728-431: Was expected to assume the throne upon the old king's death. Next in line to the throne behind the Grand Dauphin was his eldest son- Louis's father Le Petit Dauphin and then Louis's elder brother, a child named Louis, Duke of Brittany. Disease, however, steered the line of succession forward three generations and sideways: on 14 April 1711 the Grand Dauphin, died of smallpox , and less than a year later, on 12 February 1712

42946-496: Was forced to flee to the fortified port of Danzig , while on 5 October Augustus III was crowned in Warsaw. Cardinal Fleury responded with a carefully orchestrated campaign of diplomacy. He first won assurances from Britain and Holland that they would not interfere in the war, while lining up alliances with Spain and Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia in exchange for pieces of the Habsburg monarchy . On 10 October 1733, Louis formally declared war against Austria. A French army occupied

43164-410: Was in the council and who, because of a dramatic change in the laws of succession instituted by Louis XIV, and, as his oldest surviving male descendant, could now legally become king if the legitimate direct line of succession became extinguished. In August 1714, shortly before his own death, the King rewrote his will to restrict the powers of the regent; it stipulated that the nation was to be governed by

43382-438: Was installed as Regent with full powers to act in the name of the King in all matters. On 9 September 1715, Philippe had the young King transported away from the court in Versailles to Paris, where the Regent had his own residence in the Palais Royal . On 12 September, the King performed his first official act, opening the first lit de justice of his reign at the Palais Royal. From September 1715 until January 1716 he lived in

43600-444: Was installed in the Courtyard of Honor in 1989, to mark the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution. His design was selected after an international competition; the granite sphere contains a small heart made of gold. A work by the Belgian artist Pierre Alechinsky was created in 1992 and occupies a small rotunda along the passageway between the Hotel de Lassay and the Palais Bourbon. It is titled "The Fragile Garden" and illustrates

43818-422: Was instructed in Latin, Italian, history and geography, astronomy, mathematics and drawing, and cartography. The King had charmed the visiting Russian Tsar in 1717 by identifying the major rivers, cities and geographic features of Russia. In his later life the King retained his passion for science and geography; he created departments in physics (1769) and mechanics (1773) at the Collège de France , and he sponsored

44036-436: Was intended for the use of Napoleon during his rare visits to the building. Both these rooms retain much of their original decor, tromp-l'oeil paintings by Alexandre-Évariste Fragonard , the son of the famous court painter of Louis XIV. After the fall of Napoleon in 1814, the Bourbon monarchy was restored under Louis XVIII, but preserved some of the democratic institutions begun during the Revolution. The new government, like

44254-425: Was named a Lady of the Court of the Queen, and a month later the King ordered her older sister to leave the Court and to live in Paris. The King made his new mistress the Duchess of Châteauroux. The King's relationships with the sisters became a subject of gossip in the court and in Paris, where a popular comic poem was recited, ending: "Choosing an entire family – is that being unfaithful, or constant?" In June 1744,

44472-429: Was nine, she played Youth in a ballet dedicated to the Dauphine of France . She also inherited her mother's sharp and caustic wit, the famous Mortemart esprit , which made her popular with some but not with others. Saint-Simon later said of the future Princess of Condé:. . her face was formed by the most tender loves and her nature made to dally with them. She possessed the art of placing everyone at their ease; there

44690-469: Was nothing about her which did not tend naturally to please, with a grace unparalleled, even in her slightest actions. She made captive even those who had the most cause to fear her, and those who had the best of reasons to hate her required often to recall the fact to resist her charms. Sportive, gay, and merry, she passed her youth in frivolity and in pleasures of all kinds, and, whenever the opportunity presented itself, they extended even to debauchery. She

44908-425: Was proclaimed at the Palais Bourbon. On May 15 a mob with red flags invaded the chamber, demanding a much more radical government. Another unsuccessful attempt to seize the government was launched by in June 1848. A new National Assembly was elected, and a new president, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte , the nephew of the Emperor, who had lived most of his life in exile. On December 2, 1851, when the Assembly refused to change

45126-404: Was purchased by Louis XV , who seems to have wished to include it in the plan of the new place Royale (now the Place de la Concorde) which he was building on the other side of the river. But in 1756 he sold it to grandson of the Duchess, Louis Joseph, Prince of Condé , who had been a military hero in the just-concluded Seven Years' War . The Prince decided to largely rebuild it, turning it from

45344-414: Was rectangular, and more modest in size. The two buildings had identical facades facing the Seine. The facades featured alternating columns and windows, and decoration on the themes of the seasons, the elements, and, fitting for the daughter of the Sun King, about Apollo. The space between the buildings, and between the buildings and the Seine, was filled with gardens. In addition to the large reception rooms,

45562-529: Was rejected by the British government. A few months later, on 16 January 1756, Frederick the Great of Prussia signed the Treaty of Westminster , allying himself with Britain. Louis responded immediately on 1 May 1756 by sealing a formal defensive treaty with Austria, the first Treaty of Versailles , offering to defend Austria in case of a Prussian attack – a reversal of France's historic conflict with Austria. Louis declared war on Great Britain on 9 June 1756, confident of success. The French navy quickly defeated

45780-437: Was replaced by Jean Aubert , also a former assistant of Hardouin-Mansart. Aubert had built one of the grandest projects of the time, the stables of the royal residence at Chantilly. In the meanwhile, the construction of the neighbouring Hôtel de Lassay had begun, following a plan by another noted architect, Jacques Gabriel , the designer of the buildings around the Place de la Concorde. Both buildings were finished in 1728. Both

45998-457: Was signed on 25 November 1721, and the future bride came to France and took up residence in the Louvre. However, after the death of the Regent, in 1725, the new Prime Minister decided she was too young to have children soon enough, and she was sent back to Spain. During the rest of the Regency, France was at peace, and in 1720, the Regent decreed an official silence on religious conflicts. Montesquieu and Voltaire published their first works, and

46216-416: Was soon surrounded by the Germans. The leader of the provisional government, Léon Gambetta , had to escape from Paris by balloon. The Palais Bourbon was abandoned; the Assembly moved first to Bordeaux, then to Versailles. The Paris Commune seized power in the city in March 1871, but in May was suppressed by the French Army. The Palais Bourbon escaped destruction, unlike the Tuileries Palace , Hotel de Ville,

46434-433: Was the Dowager Princess of Conti , lived in the Hôtel de Conti , opposite the Louvre , on the Quai de Conti. Her older brother, the Duke of Maine, owned the Hôtel du Maine (destroyed 1838) on the rue Bourbon (now the rue de Lille), very near the Palais Bourbon. Her younger sister, the Duchess of Orléans, lived at the Palais-Royal , the Orléans residence in Paris. Near the Louvre and the Palais-Royal, her youngest brother,

46652-440: Was the eldest surviving legitimised daughter of Louis XIV of France and his maîtresse-en-titre Françoise-Athénaïs, Marquise de Montespan . She was said to have been named after her godmother , Louise de La Vallière , the woman her mother had replaced as the king's mistress. Before her marriage, she was known at court as Mademoiselle de Nantes. Married at the age of 11, Louise Françoise became known as Madame la Duchesse ,

46870-497: Was the great-grandson of Louis XIV and the third son of the Duke of Burgundy (1682–1712), and his wife Marie Adélaïde of Savoy , who was the eldest daughter of Victor Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy . He was born in the Palace of Versailles on 15 February 1710 and was immediately styled the Duke of Anjou. At this time, the possibility of the Duke of Anjou becoming the next king seemed rather remote as Louis XIV's eldest son and heir, Louis's paternal grandfather Louis Le Grand Dauphin ,

47088-467: Was the meeting place of the Council of Five Hundred , which chose the government leaders. Beginning in 1806, during Napoleon 's French Empire , Bernard Poyet's Neoclassical facade was added to mirror that of the Church of the Madeleine , facing it across the Seine beyond the Place de la Concorde. The palace complex today has a floor area of 124,000 m (1,330,000 sq ft), with over 9,500 rooms, in which 3,000 people work. The complex includes

47306-424: Was the pious Marie Thérèse de Bourbon ; Marie Thérèse was in turn the oldest sister of Louise Françoise's husband. Louise Françoise's fourth daughter Marie Anne , born in 1697, was thought to have been the result of this affair. When her husband discovered his wife's infidelity, he was furious but did not openly quarrel with the Prince of Conti due to a fear of his father-in-law, Louis XIV. Her older half-brother,

47524-403: Was wearing. When the news reached Paris, anxious crowds gathered in the streets. The Pope, the Archduchess of Austria, and King George II, with whom France was at war, sent messages hoping for his swift recovery. Damiens was tortured to see if he had accomplices, and was tried before the Parlement of Paris , which had been the most vocal critic of the King. The Parlement demonstrated its loyalty to

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