Petit appartement de la reine

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This article is about the petit appartement de la reine of the Palace of Versailles.

[edit] Le petit appartement de la reine

These rooms, situated behind the grand appartement de la reine, and which now open onto two interior courtyards, were the private domain of the queens of France, Marie-Thérèse, Marie Leszczyska, and Marie-Antoinette. Evolving with the building campaigns of Louis XIV, the petit appartement de la reine^[1], likewise evolved.

Marie-Thérèse

At the completion of LeVau’s envelope, a suite of small rooms opened onto the cour de marbre (rooms later incorporated into the appartement du roi) and onto a small interior courtyard — at the time called the cour de la reine. In these rooms, Marie-Thérèse led her private and family life. Very little information survived about the décor or the arrangement of these rooms, owing largely to her early death in 1683. What is known is that a redecoration of these rooms occurred in 1697 when Marie-Adélaïde de Savoie married Louis XIV's grandson, the duc de Bourgogne. When Marie-Adélaïde died in 1712, the rooms were divided among the king and various other residents.

Marie Leszczyska

From the time of her marriage, the petit appartement de la reine underwent a number of transitions. One of the more significant transitions occurred when additional rooms were built. With these new rooms, the cour de la reine was divided into two courtyards — the cour du dauphin (to the east) and the cour du Monseigneur (to the west). With regard to these rooms, Pierre de Nolhac published a partial description of the petit appartement de la reine as it appeared at the time of the death of Marie-Leszczyska:

• oratory
• annex to the oratory
• boudoir
• grand cabinet
• bathroom
• laboratory (Marie-Leszczyska was known to have had a strong interest in science.)

None of the décor of the petit appartement de la reine — except for a small room that communicates between the grand cabinet and the appartement du roi — has survived. When Marie-Antoinette moved into these rooms in 1774, a complete reorganization and redecoration of the rooms, under the direction of Richard Mique, was ordered.

Marie-Antoinette

The fame of the petit appartement de la reine rests squarely in the hands of the last queen of France during the Ancien Régime. The restored state of the rooms that one sees today at Versailles replicate the petit appartement de la reine as it probably looked during Marie-Antoinette’s day. The principle rooms of the petit appartement are:

• cabinet doré (former grand cabinet of Marie Leszczyska)
• library
• annex to the library^[2]
• billiard room
• cabinet de la méridienne
• bathroom
• toilette à l’anglaise^[3]
• various service rooms
• fun rooms

During Marie-Antoinette's day, these rooms served the queen’s daily private life. For example, in the morning, the cabinet de la méridienne, which was decorated by Richard Mique to commemorate the birth of the dauphin, was the room in which Marie-Antoinette would choose the clothing she would wear that day.^[4]

Of all the features of the petit appartement de la reine, the so-called secret passage that links the grand appartement de la reine with the appartement du roi must be cited. The passage actually dates from the time of Marie-Thérèse, and had always served as a private means by which the king and queen could communicate with each other.^[5] It is true, however, that Marie-Antoinette, who was sleeping in the chambre de la reine in the grande appartement de reine, escaped from the Paris mob on the night of 6/7 October 1789 by using this route. The entrance to the so-called secret passage is through a door located on the west side of the north wall of the chambre de la reine.

[edit] Notes