Vincennes - highest keep in France

The Capetian monarchs established a hunting lodge in the forest of Vincennes, not far from Paris, in the 12th century. John II (1350-1364) initiated work on a keep nearby. This was during the Hundred Years War. His son Charles V completed it around 1370. It is 52 m high. There was a protective wall with nine towers around it and work started on a gothic masterpiece, the Chapel.

For centuries, monarchs took refuge here. Henry V of England died in the keep (donjon) in 1422 following the siege of Meaux.  Louis XIV did some sporadic building here but finally settled at Versailles in 1682. The stronghold thus lost its status as a Royal residence but from the time of the French Revolution it became a major arsenal. It was modified by Napoleon I. Then it became a state prison for a long time. Notable prisoners included Nicolas Fouquet, Voltaire and the Marquis de Sade. Mata Hari was shot there for spying.

During the battle for Paris' liberation in August 1944, Waffen-SS German soldiers arrested and executed 26 French policemen and members of the French Resistance at the Chateau. After learning that Paris had been liberated by Allied troops, the SS soldiers set off explosions at Vincennes, badly damaging parts of the fortress.

Some minimum fitness is required to climb the stairs inside the keep, to access various levels. You can visit the chatelet terrace which gives views over the whole site. Charles V's study can be viewed. He worked there a lot, assisted by two secretaries in the two adjoining turrets. Walking around the ramparts is interesting, as the King would have done the same walk during the Middle Ages. It was later covered over. We know there were painted walls but the colours and designs have been lost over time. Some ancient graffiti still remains.

Inside the keep there is the council room. It would have been used for receptions and working meetings between the king and his advisors or even as the King's bedroom if necessary. Other levels contain the bedchamber which has a nice fireplace. The King would have put his best manuscripts in a chest placed in the window recesses. Painted rafters, though damaged and faded, suggest what the exquisite interior decoration might have been. The treasure room did not, alas, contain any treasure during the visit.

We did not get to visit the chapel. It was closed for a very lengthy lunch break and we had not been warned when we arrived, so that was annoying, but though styled like La Saint Chapelle in Paris, it is not as impressive so we didn't mind so much. The relics of the Crown of Thorns were temporarily housed there while the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris was being readied to receive them.

The restoration work on the keep and walls is well done but there is still much to do.

Apartment buildings for the King and Queen need doing. The King's building is being used to house France's military archives so researchers can easily visit it. The Queen's building seems to be locked and rather destitute, awaiting significant funds, I imagine.

This site is worth a visit. I hope in future an effort will be made to re-establish gardens there as it's a rather sterile site, especially in the heat of summer.


http://www.chateau-de-vincennes.fr/en/

Chateau d'Anet - disappointing

Here is an example of lost history that begins with a great story but can be a disappointing tourism experience. Mostly it's about Henri II and his favourite mistress Diane de Poitiers. Naughty goings-on, of course.

Diane as born in 1499 and married Louis de Breze who was 40 years her elder. Through this marriage Diane was often called to the court of Francois 1. Her skills and interest in hunting went down well with various men. In particular she caught the eye of of the second son of the King, Henri. Diane's husband died at Anet in 1531. She genuinely mourned him.

Although Henri was married to Catherine de Medici he took Diane as his secret mistress. Henri came to the throne in 1547 and in the meantime Diane was busy enlarging and improving the Anet property. She added monograms of herself and King Henri which can still be seen. Gradually the relationship became less and less secret; the court often visited Anet for entertainments and, of course, Catherine de Medici was not happy but she bid her time.

Henri died violently in 1559 - killed by an arrow through the eye during a tournament. The new king was still a child so Catherine, his mother became regent. Diane tried to make peace with the most powerful woman in France by returning the crown jewels to her but Catherine remained dangerous and confiscated her magnificent chateau at Chennonceau. Diane stayed a refugee at Anet and designed a tomb for herself which you can visit.

Over the centuries the estate was handed down, sold, put on hold, changed. As with most chateaux, things deteriorated during the French Revoltion and many things of value were stolen and lost. In 1804 Diane's damaged estate fell into the hands of a new owner who demolished major wings of the building, felled all the trees in the park.
The chapel was untouched. The inhabitants of Anet town were not happy about the vandalism and riot ensued.

The chateau remained empty and abandoned until purchased by the dowager duchess d'Orleans who was daughter of the Duc de Penthievre. She died less than 9 months after purchasing it and her son, the future King Louis-Philippe, couldn't afford to retore the property so it was sold and resold. Some restoration work occured once it was purchased by an architect and this drew the attention of the Ministry for the Interior which classified parts as historical monuments and accorded a substantial subsidy.

The old park had been designed by Le Notre (Louis XIV's famous garden designer) but was now unrecognisable. Years passed, it changed hands. During 1914 the owner turned it into a Red Cross hospital. The property suffered greatly during WW2 with outlying buildings bombed and up in flames with all their furnishings and books. The German military occupied it. Fighting around it in 1945 . saw the surrounding forest destroyed. Restoration has taken place over the years and it is still of some interest but it is far from what it was in Diane's day. In fact only a third of the main chateau remains, the gardens are truly boring, most of the interesting landscape features are long gone.

While the chapel is now pretty much in it's original state, as is Diane's tomb (having had bits retrieved from being cattle troughs) the rest of the place is disappointing. Most of what is left is not open to the public, only a few rooms. They contain furniture from Diane's period, which is quite a rare thing these days, as well as collectables over the centuries. You are not allowed to take any photos inside the chateau. You are not allowed in the park. It is not a pretty site. The bare minimum has been done around the back of the chapel.

The visitor experience could be so much improved if a potager or medicinal garden was reinstated and if more rooms were available for viewing, even if the current owners have their own private areas which they use over winter months. It would be helpful if a display of the various changes to the estate was available for viewing. One could allow visitors to stoll along the man-made lake, have some refreshments etc. Alas none of this is possible. The owner, who must have plenty of money to own the property will be supported, to some extent, by subsidies from the State to keep it maintained.  Parts of the front buildings have rather large fissures and seem to be out of use.

Yes, I know very well it takes a lot of money to keep these places going but to attract more visitors and to give them a better experience the management will need to create a longer and more interesting experience for them. We arrived on a very hot day and there was nowhere to get a drink. It seemed to us that the owner was Ok letting us see a few rooms for a fee and couldn't be bothered otherwise. Well, that's the impression I and others comment on.

They have a minimal shop where I bought a copy of an engraving of the original estate in Diane's time as an example of true Renaissance achievement.

Conciergerie - a temple of death

If you are exploring the Ile de la Cite, in Paris, and you are planning to visit the Sainte-Chapelle, you might as well tack on a visit to the Conciergerie, right next door.

Originally built over the remains of a Roman palace, the first small palace of Merovingian kings was turned into a grandiose castle by the Capetian dynasty's successive kings. Philip Augustus, Louis IX and Philip IV transformed it into a residence.

 The Conciergerie, an important remnant of the palace, provides a remarkable example of 14th century civil architecture with the Salle des Gens d'Armes (1302), Salle des Gardes and the historic kitchens.
Other than the Saint-Chapelle, the lower parts of the the palace are all that remain of the medieval royal residence. They served the needs of the king and his family and substantial staff, totalling 2000 people.

Almost the entire lower level of the palace was turned into a prison in the 15th century; you can visit the dungeons, as well as the Chapel where Marie Antoinette was held prisoner during the French Revolution and which is now dedicated to her memory.

The site is presently used mostly for law courts. It was part of the former royal palace, the Palais de la Cite, which comprised the Conciergerie, Palais de Justice and the Sainte-Chapelle. During the French Revolution hundreds of prisoners were taken from the Conciergerie to be executed by guillotine at various locations around Paris.

Three towers survive from the medieval Conciergerie: the Caesar Tower, named in honor of the Roman Emperors; the Silver Tower, named for its supposed use as the store for the royal treasure; and the Bonbec Tower, named for the torture chamber that it housed. The building was extended during the reigns of later kings, with France's first public clock being installed about 1370. The current clock dates from 1535.

The dungeons, which have not been used for the last thirty years, are twenty-three feet in length by eleven and a half in height. Depending on the financial resources of  prisoners they could have a personal cell or have to share with many others. They could be afforded pen and paper and occasional visitors or they could be lying on the floor in communal excrement.

Marie Antoinette spent her last days here and went through the normal prisoner preparation for the guillotine. Her young son aged 10 who became known as Louis XVII (though he was much too young to be crowned, even in monarchist times) died a miserable death here from sickness and neglect. Only one of her children, Marie-Thérèse Charlotte, lived past the age of 11, survived the Revolution and went into exile.

There are various exhibitions including audiovisual ones you can view during your visit and there is a souvenir shop. There isn't much available in English, alas, other than a couple of books. Notable things to see are examples of locks and bolts, the flood level indicator to show just how high the Seine flooded in 1910, a prison guard's office and an administration office.

Visitors can view the largest fireplaces I've ever seen by visiting the site of the old kitchens. They were built in 1350-1364 by John the Good. There's nothing else to see there though.

There's a fair bit on the Revolution. The prison quickly filled with suspects, accused of threatening the Republic. A visual presentation allows you to follow the lives of prisoners whose conditions depended on their own financial resources.

Palais de la Cite
2 boulevard du Palais
75001 Paris
Average length of visit 1+ hours

Royal Chapel Dreux is a stunning necropolis

This is a 19th century building that houses the remains of royalty and their relatives from the Bourbon-Orleans family. The site itself at Dreux stretches back in time to 1023 though before that it was probably a Gallo-Romain site designed to protect the roads from Paris to Chartres. It was also at the crossroads of Viking incursions and skirmishes between various duchies.

A castle with eight round towers was constructed with a massive circular keep just after 1137 and vestiges of this can still be seen.

The town of Dreux and its region endured terrible suffering during the Hundred Years War and in 1421 it ended up in the hands of King Henry V of England. Over the centuries it was owned by various princes of the Bourbon family and ended up being partly demolished due to neglect. In the 18C the French Revolution had a bad effect here as the revolutionaries dug up and despoiled the graves and bodies of various nobles who had been interred on the site. Bodily remains were thrown in a ditch. In 1794 the great keep was blown up to use the stones for other things.

With the restoration of the Bourbons, the Duchess d'Orléans returned from exile and built a chapel which was completed in 1818 and the first of the coffins to house her family's remains was installed. Her son became Louis-Philippe, King of France in 1830 and he thought the chapel too small. It was radically enlarged and improved to the finest standards and it's this version we can visit to day. It showcases outstanding 19C craftsmanship.

The stained glass windows are, in fact, not your usual sort. The factory of Sèvres was commissioned to supply them but the old techniques had been lost. The director of Sèvres, who happened to be a mineralogist, conducted research and came up with some stunning results for painted glass.  The themes are all religious/political/allegorical.

In a side part of the chapel there is a set of beautifully executed painted glass works which one is not allowed to photograph. The detail is stunning and the lighting effects quite awesome. Mostly they feature depressing religious stories to do with Christ but somehow the light coming through behind the paintings lifts certain parts in an uplifting way.

The chapel was badly damaged during World War Two at the moment of liberation in 1944 when German shells struck several windows. Some windows could never be repaired as those skills have been lost.

The carving of the recumbent stone statues is very fine and different to what you usually see in cathedrals because this site is relatively modern. The sculptors have endeavoured to suggest the types of materials worn by the dead. They have carved to simulate lace, velvet, silk and the effect is impressive, natural and lacks any sense of the macabre.

This is an archaeological site too but with many of the stone coffins broken and ransacked with the contents dismembered and thrown away, most coffins would not hold much these days. The more modern section contains tombs for certain members who aren't actually interred there as their remains cannot be repatriated from sites such as Malta.

The stories behind many members of this family are sad, tragic, full of greed and ambition and some good works but in the end... exile and failure. The other branch of this family which was more directly associated with Louis XVI, Louis XVII and lastly Louis XVIII also failed politically though distant relations are still in existence  - the ones who survived the various revolutions, exile and world wars until the present day.

Tombs of particular note:

• Louise-Marie-Adelaide de Bourbon-Penthievre (1753-1821)The dowager Duchess d'Orléans who built the first chapel
• King Louis-Philippe (1773-1850) and Queen Marie-Amelie

Their brothers and sisters, children, grandchildren, wives and cousins are here. In a lower crypt not open to the public is the heart of Philippe d'Orléans (1674-1723), Regent of France and who was Louis XIV's nephew and thus regent to LouisXVI.

What surprised me me about all this is that it seemed to be common practice to remove organs from royal corpses and inter them in coffins in different places.

For more than a century the Chapel de Saint Louis has remained a necropolis reserved for funerals and memorial services but these days it also welcomes weddings and christenings of the young princes

Henri d’Orléans, Count of Paris and pretender to the defunct French throne, died in January 2019 - exactly 226 years after his distant cousin Louis XVI was guillotined in Paris.
His death, aged 85, was announced on Facebook by his son  Jean-Carl Pierre Marie d’Orléans who was born in 1962. So, the ancient Capetian dynasty lives on.

Carcassonne

Carcassonne is a French fortified city between Toulouse and Montpellier in the Aude department.

From a distance it is really a sight to behold. Gallo-Roman, it's a one-of-a-kind aged 2000 years. Following the demise of the Romans, the Visigoths took over.

The fortified town is made up of two concentric walls with 53 towers and barbicans to prevent attacks by seige machines. One of the towers housed the catholic Inquisition around the 13th century. The walls have a drawbridge and ditch. There are lots of houses  inside because it really is a city. The modern stuff is around the outside.

It is famous for its role in the crusades when the city was an Occitane Cathar stronghold. Other Cathar castles and constructions exist but they are mostly very much in ruins, crumbling away on rocky promontories in the general area.

In 1659 the border province of Roussillon was transferred to France and so Carcassonne's military significance was reduced. The fortifications were abandoned in favour of commerce, particularly woollen textiles, until the end of the 18th century.

Carcassonne was demilitarised under Napoleon and the Restoration, and the fortified cité of Carcassonne fell into such disrepair that the French government decided to demolish it. That decision caused an uproar and a campaign to save it began. Architect Eugene Viollet-le-Duc took to restoring it in 1853 while he was finishing restoration work on the Saint Denis Basilica in Paris.

It was a controversial restoration because he covered over the towers and roofed them with slate, which never occurs in the South of France. He should have used the usual clay tiles. Still, his efforts have created something well worth preserving and it's a key tourist destination. It was added to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites in 1997. Carcassone is very touristy and also relies on manufacturing and wine-making for its economy.

As a site it is impressive, and we took a guided tour as well as a very bouncy jaunt around the outside by a little train. The train has English language options but the guided tours are only available in French. The crowds were uncomfortably thick, the souvenirs tend to be kitchy and much the same sort of thing as you find at Mont Saint-Michel. Food outlets pepper the place.
Aside from the little train, you can take a carriage ride but I felt sorry for the two horses slogging it out in the heat, even though they wore protection.

You can visit the church/cathedral which is much as you would expect. It is in active use in the city. Many people walk the ramparts and visit the chateau. We didn't because of the crowds. The population of Carcassonne is around 50,000. That would be inside and mostly outside the fortifications.

Despite this being a very commercial site I bought nothing there. JC bought a sweat shirt but an hour later left it behind at a cafe and forgot about it until walking back all the way to our lodgings on the other side of the Rhone. You should beware of pick-pockets too. I had the good fortune to have a room across the Rhone so I could see Carcassonne floodlit at night. That was great but the mistral was starting to build up a head of steam which meant a light jacket at night was a good idea.

There's a train station and a small airport. It was really odd to see heavy modern passenger planes flying low over the cité.

You can combine a visit to Carcassonnne with a visit to Toulouse or Montpellier . We arrived from Millau and a drive through the Gorges du Tarn.