Église de la Madeleine

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L'église de la Madeleine, or L'église Sainte-Marie-Madeleine (or simply "La Madeleine"), is a church in a commanding position in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, in its present form designed as a temple to the glory of Napoleon's army.

The Madeleine

[edit] History

The site of this edifice, centered at the end of rue Royale, a line-of-sight between Gabriel's twin hôtels in the Place de la Concorde, required a suitably monumental end from the time the square was established in 1755, as Place Louis XV. The settlement round the site, called Ville l'Évêque, for it had belonged to the bishop of Paris since the time of Philip II of France, when Bishop Maurice de Sully seized the synagogue that stood on the site from the Jews of Paris in 1182, and duly consecrated it a Church dedicated to Mary Magdalene. The site has been annexed to the city of Paris since 1722.

Two false starts were made on building a church on this site. The reconstruction of the older church consecrated to Mary Magdalene was considered. The first design, commissioned in 1757, with construction begun with the King's ceremonial placing of the cornerstone, 3 April 1763, was halted in 1764; that first design, by Pierre Contant d'Ivry, was based on Mansart's Late Baroque church of Les Invalides, with a dome surmounting a Latin cross. In 1777 Contant d'Ivry died and was replaced by his pupil Guillaume-Martin Couture, who decided to start anew, razing the incomplete construction, shortening the nave and basing his new, more centralized design on the Roman Pantheon. At the start of the Revolution, however, only the foundations and the grand portico had been finished; the choir of the former church was demolished in 1797, but work was discontinued while debate simmered as to what purpose the eventual building might serve in Revolutionary France: a library, a public ballroom, and a marketplace were all suggested. In the meantime, the National Assembly was housed in the Palais Bourbon behind a pedimented colonnaded front that was inspired by the completed portico at the far end of the former rue Royale.

The Maison Carrée, Nîmes, for comparison

In 1806 Napoleon made his decision to erect a memorial, a Temple de la Gloire de la Grande Armée ("Temple to the Glory of the Great Army"); following an elaborate competition with numerous entries and a jury that decided on a design by Beaumont, the Emperor trumped all, instead commissioning Pierre-Alexandre Barthélémy Vignon (1763-1828) to build his design on an antique temple (Compare the Maison Carrée, Nîmes, illustration left.) The then-existing foundations were razed, preserving the standing columns, and work begun anew. With completion of the Arc de Triomphe in 1808, the original commemorative role for the temple was blunted.

After the fall of Napoleon, with the Catholic reaction during the Restoration, King Louis XVIII determined that the structure would be used as a church, dedicated to Mary Magdalene. Vignon died in 1828 before completing the project and was replaced by Jacques-Marie Huvé. A new competition was set up in 1828-29, to determine the design for sculptures for the pediment, a Last Judgment, in which Mary Magdalene knelt to intercede for the Damned; the winner was Charles Lemaire. The July Monarchy rededicated the monument of repentance for Revolution as a monument of national reconciliation, and the nave was vaulted in 1831. In 1837 it was briefly suggested that the building might best be utilized as a train station, but the building was finally consecrated as a church in 1842.

[edit] Architecture

Interior of the Église de la Madeleine, Paris

The Madeleine is built in the Neo-Classical style and was inspired by the Maison Carrée at Nîmes, the best-preserved of all Roman temples. Its fifty-two Corinthian columns, each 20 metres high, are carried around the entire building. The pediment sculpture of the Last Judgement is by Lemaire, and the church's bronze doors bear reliefs representing the Ten Commandments.

Inside, the church has a single nave with three domes over wide arched bays, lavishly gilded in a decor inspired as much by Roman baths as by Renaissance artists. At the rear of the church, above the high altar, stands a statue by Charles Marochetti depicting St Mary Magdalene being carried up to heaven by two angels. The half-dome above the altar is frescoed by Jules-Claude Ziegler, entitled The History of Christianity, showing the key figures in the Christian religion with—a sign of its Second Empire date— Napoleon occupying centre stage.

[edit] Today

The Madeleine is affiliated with a Benedictine abbey, and masses and the most fashionable weddings in Paris are still celebrated here.

The church has a celebrated pipe organ, built by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll (1811-1899), which is widely regarded as one of the best in Paris. The composers Camille Saint-Saëns and Gabriel Fauré were both organists at the Madeleine, and the funerals of Frédéric Chopin, Saint-Saëns, and Fauré were held there.

To its south lies the Place de la Concorde, to the east is the Place Vendôme, and to the west L'église Saint-Augustin.