Versailles shows the enduring power of the French state

Between economic, political and social crisis, and jihadist attacks that have claimed 234 lives in France since January 2015, the country sometimes seems to doubt its own identity.

But if proof of the perennity of the French state were needed, it can be found in the massive palace at Versailles, which once housed 4,000 people.

In their speeches, French leaders often refer to the rayonnement, or influence, of France. Built by the Sun King Louis XIV more than 300 years ago, Versailles symbolises that radiance.

Tourists from across the world still flock here, despite fears of terrorism. French soldiers in bullet proof vests wander through the crowds, carrying assault rifles.

France saw monarchy, revolution, republic, empire, then more or less the same sequence all over again in the 18th and 19th centuries. With the exception of the 1940-1944 German occupation, it has been a republic since 1870. Bourbons, Bonapartes, Bourbons (again) and their Orleans cousins all inhabited the palace.

Louis XIV reigned for 72 years. Now tourists gawk at the red and gold brocade bed where the first valet whispered into the king’s ear at 8 every morning: “Sire, it is time.”

Royal commode

Two ceremonies, the petit lever and the grand lever ensued, during which dozens of people watched the king rise from bed, put on his slippers and dressing gown and sit on his chaise d'affaire or pierced chair toilet. One could even purchase a permit to watch his royal highness on the commode. Some historians interpret performing the bodily function in public as a mark of power.

The lives of French leaders are still scrutinised. When President Francois Hollande was photographed on the back of a motor scooter en route to an assignation with Julie Gayet, la favorite, the country talked of little else for weeks.

The kings’ pleasure was Versailles’s raison d’être. Pastimes included hunting, gambling, billiards, banquets, music, dancing and seduction. Louis XV loved botany and women. Louis XVI was fascinated by clocks. He spent July 14th, 1789, the day the Bastille was stormed, tinkering with time pieces at Versailles.

Marie Antoinette frolicked with her Swedish lover, Count Axel von Fersen, in the Petit Trianon, a lovely, smaller chateau on the grounds of Versailles. She installed a pulley system that made it possible to hide interior windows with mirrors, and built a mock hamlet where she and her courtesans played at being milkmaids.

Had the Bourbons spent more time thinking about their subjects, and less time in the pursuit of pleasure, perhaps the revolution might not have happened.

French revolutions are reversible. Twenty-one years after France beheaded Louis XVI, his brothers Louis XVIII and Charles X ruled the country for an aggregate of 16 years. Four years after he was run out of office, Nicolas Sarkozy this week rented a presidential campaign headquarters. He stands a good chance of returning to power.

Since 1789, wise rulers have kept an eye on public opinion. When Louis Philippe, "the bourgeois king", came to power in 1830, he turned the main palace at Versailles into a museum, and moved with his family into the Grand Trianon, the pink marble and porphyry palace that Louis XIV had built to escape from the stress of the big palace.

Hair scandal

French leaders still live in grand style, but every excess risks creating a scandal. Last month, Hollande was embarrassed by the revelation that his coiffeur is paid €9,895 monthly. In 2014, Aquilino Morelle, a high-ranking presidential adviser, resigned when it was revealed that he owned 30 pairs of luxury shoes, which he had polished in the Élysée Palace.

President Charles de Gaulle was prudish, and didn’t like the idea that the Élysée was built by Louis XV for Madame de Pompadour. In the early 1960s, he asked his culture minister, André Malraux, to renovate the Grand Trianon for presidential use.

French media claimed the project was costing billions. Editorialists condemned de Gaulle’s monarchical tendencies. So the general followed Louis Philippe’s example and defused criticism by turning half the Grand Trianon into a museum.

De Gaulle gave La Lanterne, an 18th century hunting lodge and grounds contiguous to Versailles, to Malraux after extremists in the OAS, who opposed independence for Algeria, blew up Malraux's apartment.

From 1969 until 2007, La Lanterne was reserved for French prime ministers. Sarkozy reappropriated it for himself and Carla Bruni, who held their wedding dinner there in 2008. Now Hollande spends weekends there with Julie Gayet, just a wall away from the magnificence of Versailles.