Saturday, 4 August 2012

Versailles




The grounds of Versailles: Organization for display purposes only.

If civilization is measured by the state of the sciences and the arts then the age of enlightenment represented a great leap forwards. I was reminded of this during a recent visit to the Palace of Versailles. It was hot, crowded and my feet ached but I heard the optimistic strains of Kenneth Clarke’s series “Civilization” in my head as I walked from room to room.  

In the seventeenth century, after 1600 years, the pinnacle of European culture had shifted from the lands of the Roman and Byzantine empires to France. The greater part of Versailles was developed during the reign of Louis XIV from 1643-1715, a period that falls squarely within Isaac Newton’s life time of 1642-1727.

European rulers like the Louis XIV were the focus of great power and wealth, but although they were the patrons of the arts and sciences little of their wealth was used to better the lot of the common people. My reading of history is that this failure to bring the fruits of civilization to the masses was down to a combination of factors, from the legacies of a still largely medieval infrastructure, through poor information and control, to an unwillingness of monarchs to distribute government, particularly amongst the business community.

There may have been many new ideas abroad in society, but at that time there was no more chance of using those ideas to better society as a whole than using the new Newtonian mechanics to get to the moon. Many more elements needed to be put in place before that could happen. Instead the European monarchs embarked on military campaigns and huge building projects like Versailles. Versailles was a statement of Louis XIV’s absolute power and evidence that indulgence in civilization was the privilege of relatively few.

Like the other great houses and halls I have posted on in this blog Versailles was chiefly about ostentation and show, its intention being to glorify the occupant of the palace. But Versailles does it on a scale that is unknown in the British Isles, a place where wealth and power was never as concentrated as it was in the France of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Some relevant links

My Facebook album on my visit to Versailles and Paris:
Versailles in 3D:

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