ILLUSTRATIONS
[Some illustrations have been moved from within paragraphs for ease of reading. (note of e-text transcriber.)]
| La Tour de L’Horloge, les “Tour pointues” de la Conciergerie et le Marché aux Fleurs | [Frontispiece] |
| PAGE | |
| Le Vieux Louvre | [3] |
| The Louvre of To-day | [5] |
| Palais des Tuileries | [9] |
| Palais-Royal | [15] |
| L’Église St-Germain-l’Auxerrois | [20] |
| Place et Colonne Vendôme | [31] |
| Portail de St-Eustache | [37] |
| La Tour de L’Horloge, les “Tours Pointues” de la Conciergerie et le Marché aux Fleurs | [46] |
| La Sainte-Chapelle | [48] |
| Rue Quincampoix | [63] |
| St-Nicolas-des-Champs | [65] |
| Rue Beaubourg | [67] |
| La Porte du Temple | [71] |
| Porte de Clisson | [75] |
| Ruelle de Sourdis | [77] |
| Hôtel Vendôme, Rue Béranger | [79] |
| Notre-Dame | [87] |
| Rue Massillon | [89] |
| Place de Grève | [95] |
| La Tour St-Jacques | [97] |
| View across the Seine from Place du Châtelet | [99] |
| Rue Brisemiche | [101] |
| L’Église St-Gervais | [103] |
| Hôtel de Beauvais, Rue François-Miron | [105] |
| Rue Vieille-du-Temple | [109] |
| Rue Éginhard | [113] |
| Rue du Prévôt | [115] |
| Hôtel de Sens | [117] |
| Rue de Birague, Place des Vosges | [121] |
| La Bastille | [124] |
| Rue St-Séverin | [127] |
| Église St-Séverin | [129] |
| Hôtel Louis XV, Rue de la Parcheminerie | [131] |
| St-Julien-le-Pauvre | [133] |
| Bas-relief, Rue Galande | [134] |
| Le Musée de Cluny | [139] |
| St-Étienne-du-Mont | [145] |
| Interior of St-Étienne-du-Mont | [147] |
| Rue Mouffetard et St-Médard | [150] |
| Jardin et Palais du Luxembourg | [163] |
| L’Abbaye St-Germain-des-Prés | [171] |
| Cour de Rohan | [179] |
| Rue Hautefeuille | [183] |
| Castel de la Reine Blanche | [253] |
| La Salpétrière | [255] |
| Rue des Eaux, Passy | [271] |
| St-Pierre de Montmartre | [281] |
| Vieux Montmartre, Rue St-Vincent | [282] |
| Rue Mont-Cenis: Chapelle de la Trinité | [283] |
| Vieux Montmartre: Cabaret du Lapin-Agile | [284] |
| Moulin de la Galette | [287] |
| Le Mur des Fédérés | [295] |
| Old Well at Salpétrière | [311] |
| Cloître de l’Abbaye de Port-Royal | [315] |
| Remains of the Convent des Capucins | [317] |
| Hôtel de Fieubet, Quai des Célestins | [325] |
| Quai des Grands-Augustins | [333] |
| Le Pont des Arts et l’Institut | [338] |
| Pont-Neuf | [339] |
HISTORIC PARIS
CHAPTER I
THREE PALACES
THE LOUVRE
THE Louvre has existed on the selfsame site from the earliest days of the history of Paris and of France. It began as a rough hunting-lodge, erected in the time of the rois fainéants—the “do-nothing” kings: a primitive hut-like construction in the dark wolf-haunted forest to the north of the settlement on the islets of the Seine, called Leutekia, the city of mud, on account of its marshy situation, or Loutouchezi, the watery city, by its Gallic settlers, by the Romans Lutetia Parisiorum—the Paris of that long-gone age. The name Louvre, therefore, may possibly be derived from the Latin Word lupus, a wolf. More probably its origin is the old word leouare, whence lower, louvre: a habitation.
Lutetia grew in importance, and the royal hunting-lodge in its vicinity was made into a fortress. The city of mud was soon known by the tribe name only, Parisii-Paris, and the Louvre, freed from surrounding forest trees, came within the city bounds. It was gradually enlarged and strengthened. A white circle in the big court shows the site of the famous gate between two Grosses Tours built in the time of the warrior-king Philippe-Auguste. Twelve towers of smaller dimensions were added by Charles V. Each tower had its own special battalion of soldiers. The inner chambers of each had their special use. In the Tour du Trésor, the King kept his money and portable objects of great value. In the Tour de la Bibliothèque were stored the books of those days, first collected by King Charles V, and which formed the nucleus of the National Library. Charles V made many other additions and adornments, and the first clocks known in France were placed in the Louvre in the year 1370. About the same time a primitive stove—a chauffe-poële—was first put up there. The grounds surrounding the fortress were laid out with care, the chief garden stretching towards the north. A menagerie was built and peopled; nightingales sang in the groves. The palace became a sumptuous residence. Sovereigns from foreign lands were received by the Kings of France with great pomp in “Notre Chastel du Louvre, où nous nous tenons le plus souvent quand nous sommes en notre ville de Paris.”
The Louvre was the scene of two of the most important political events of the fourteenth century. In the year 1303, when Philippe-le-Bel was King, the second meeting of that imposing assembly of barons, prelates and lesser magnates of the realm which formed, as a matter of fact, the first états généraux took place there. In 1358, at the time of the rising known as the Jacquerie, Étienne Marcel, Prévôt des Marchands, made the Louvre his headquarters. In the fourteenth century a King of England held his court there: Henry V, victorious after Agincourt, kept Christmas in great state in Paris at the Louvre.