No, not my in extremis in trying to find a public bathroom; this was the real deal. Caution: history lesson approaching. Next to St. Chapelle lies the underpinnings of the original royal palace of France. In the 6th Century, Clovis, the first French king, established his royal residence on the Ile-de-la-Cite (which holds Notre Dame as well as St. Chapelle). Five centuries later, Hugues Capet, the first Capetian king, established his government in the Palais de la Cite, which thus became the seat of royal power.
In the 14th century, Philippe IV the Fair, grandson of the King who became St. Louis, made the Palace a symbol of the monarchy, and it became the seat of the Parlement de Paris, which was not a legislative body, but rather the highest judicial court in the kingdom. At the end of the 14th, Charles V left the royal residence following the assassination of his father’s advisors. He appointed a steward, or “concierge,” endowed with legal powers to run the Palace and its by-then prison. It became known as The Conciergerie, our touring venue for the day.
Built from 1302 onwards, the basement-like “Hall of Men-at-Arms” is a huge space, and the only part of the original buildings still extant. It is considered one of the finest examples of Gothic secular architecture. There are four naves like the one I’m standing in.
The floor is still at its 14th century level. The related buildings were raised higher via embankments. This hall was reserved for the Royal Guard and the king’s staff, about 2,000 people in all. Sometimes, it is good to be king. Above this space was the Great Ceremonial Hall, now disappeared, which was reached by spiral stone staircases like this beauty.
After a fire in 1776, Louis XVI modernized the Conciergerie prison. I’m not so sure that his wife, Marie Antoinette, fully appreciated the upgrades when she got put in stir there some years later. The Conciergerie became the central holding tank for the victims of the Reign of Terror. In 1790, the mayor of Paris sealed the doors of the Palace, which effectively terminated the Parlement de Paris courts. The Revolutionary Tribunal, initiated in March of 1793, took over the Conciergerie. In July, Robespierre joined the “Committee For Public Safety” (ah, poli-speak) with a program based on alleged virtue and outright terror. The “Law of Suspects” ordered the arrest of anyone presumed to be an enemy of the Revolution. Old Roby would eventually regret this.
We got a rundown on most of this history at a convenient video presentation, with hit-or-miss translations running below. Unfortunately, the area between the seats and the screen was a major thoroughfare, so we got constant blockages from folks walking by and, in some cases, oblivious to the seated audience, standing right in front of the screen.
As well as men, women got the guillotine treatment during the Terror. But, the sensibilities of the day were still observed. Women were housed separately, and even had their own courtyard in which to stroll, which Loni tried out.
The had some reconstructions of the cells. Seems you could, if you had the bucks, buy yourself some luxury (relatively speaking) while you awaited the axe. The “standard” room was for the “payeux,” the poorest prisoners, and had a bit of straw on the wood floors for seating and sleeping; the “deluxe” version for the “pistoliers” (those who could pay a few pistoles) came with a bed and chair. Sorry about the reflections; they had plexiglas across the front.
Of course, if you were the queen, you got the best, including two guards at all times. The reconstruction of her cell is on part of the actual site of her dungeon.
From all I have read, Marie got a bum rap, being accused of every sexual deviancy the fertile Girondin minds could think of: sleeping with a variety of men, sleeping with her son, engaging in who-knows-what with an infamous lesbian baroness of the time. She was pretty much railroaded, as were the other victims of the Terror. Louis got chopped on January 21, 1793, at the tender age of 38. Sometimes, it’s not good to be king. On August 1, Marie was clapped into the Conciergerie. She was tried on October 14, having been given one day’s notice to prepare a “defense.” She was found guilty of treason two days later, promptly was shorn of her hair, paraded in an open cart to the Place de la Concord, and executed. Old Robespierre must have been feeling pretty smug. He shouldn’t have.
Over 1793 and 1794, 2,780 people appeared before Fouquier-Tinville, the tribunal’s public prosecutor. The trials of famous people gave way to collective trials. In 1794, witnesses and defenders were eliminated, and tens of people were guillotined each day. Like dogs turning on their own, Robespierre himself was accused and done away with. After his fall, the Tribunal ran out of fervor and was dissolved in May of 1795, having killed thousands and accomplishing precious little in the way of permanent political reform.
But, wait, you say. What about the Bastille? Wasn’t that the prison involved in the Revolution. Well, yeah, that’s where it broke out. The mob stormed the Bastille, set free a grand total of 7 prisoners, and that was about it. The prison was soon ordered destroyed by the Committee, and no trace of it remains. The site is now occupied by a monument and the ugly-modern Opera Bastille. Worse, the monument doesn’t even relate to the events of July 14, 1789, but rather to a later revolution (how many has France had, anyway?).
Ah, well. As they say over here, “Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.” The more things change, the more they stay the same. Paris is still seething with revolutionaries, as we found out this same day when we walked by (several times) what seemed to be a day-long harangue in one of the public squares. Don’t know what the grievance was.
No storming going on today; this event was well monitored by a fleet of vans containing very serious-looking gendarmes. Too bad old Louis didn’t have gendarmes: his Swiss guards got slaughtered by the mob storming the palace. Fini.
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