The Court of Louis XIV | How To Get Ahead | Absolute History

by the 17th century life at the Royal Courts of Europe had evolved into a rarefied world of ritual and affectation nowhere more so than in France everyone at court had to grapple with the endless nuances of etiquette and flattery but for the ambitious it was the place to be seen if you wanted to get ahead in 17th century France there was only one thing for it get yourself in the presence of the king by any means necessary pull any strings you had where your finest clothes sharpen your elbows to force your way into sight of the one person who could truly make a difference to your prospects His Majesty the sun king louis xiv [Music] Loui very deliberately chose the sun to symbolize his omnipotence everywhere he went he was orbited by a multitude of people sometimes thousands at a time all hope to bask in the Kings good favor this was a system of absolute power and it was set in stone literally in this the most magnificent palace anywhere on earth their side [Music] Versailles was the ultimate expression of royal authority five thousand people living firmly under the royal thumb just five years old when he was crowned king of France Louis the fourteenth spent his marathon seventy two year reign combining the showmanship of Liberace with Stalin's grip on power he surrounded himself with yes men from talented artists and designers to kowtow in courtiers and dancing dilettantes his court was a hotbed of sex poison and scandal sure Louis was a despot but his reign produced an explosion of baroque art that celebrated as lagron siècle the splendid century [Music] in 1661 louis xiv brought his favorite mistress to versailles for a bit of royal hanky-panky he was 23 she just 17 and Versailles was a modest retreat built by Louis father for hunting trips young Louie had things other than hunting on his mind love of course but also a thrillingly ambitious plan to transform little bear sight into the ultimate power base a great Royal City under a single roof Louie recruited a string of brilliant people to realize his dream none of them more brilliant than the designer Sharla Braun before he'd even met the King LeBron had dazzled French high society with his paintings and his fabulous interiors Louie called him the greatest French artist of all time and decided what Versailles really needed was LeBrons masterful touch it was at a party that Louie decided to hire Sharla breath but it wasn't a party of the Kings he was a guest at a lavish bash thrown by his then finance minister and it was something out of Great Gatsby guests left not with goodie bags but with Diamond tiara's even horses Louie detected something suspicious and solved the problem to his own satisfaction by throwing his finance minister into jail and poaching his designer Lebrun what was the secret of LeBrons success exquisite taste naturally but also a love of all things French under Louie's watchful eye nebran stuffed versailles with the best france had to offer french tapestries French furniture French sculpture this is LeBrons masterpiece the legendary Hall of Mirrors there's a lot of glass nearly 50 chandeliers and candelabra and 357 mirrors lebra imported the finest Venetian craftsmen to make them only to swipe all their closely guarded secrets and open up a dedicated French glass factory he crowned a lot with his own spectacular paintings and none too subtle homage to the monarch whose idea it was the ceiling is one of the finest examples of Baroque art you could see anywhere there is Louie in his battle gear on his throne put he and cherubs to sport and play at his feet playing cards and other games and above him the gods look on favorably only father time with his hourglass and his size represents a threat to Louie a mortal threat and it's interesting that a paw from his poor old wife shunted off to the corner there he's the only human being in that scene he keeps company with the supernatural with the deities and the message spelt out the king governs by himself no other mortals need be involved this is the message shall libra hammered home at Versailles he is louis xiv as an omnipotent thunderbolt hurling god louie as the sun as all conquering hero no doubts here about who was the fairest of them all and LeBron did very well out of it thank you very much directorship of the French royal academy of painting plus a handsome pension at Versailles it paid too big up the boss [Music] if you were a foreigner hoping to please Louie you had to play by French rules god forbid you forgot that French Barack was a regal elegant style all its own that was the undoing of the great Italian architect Bernini famed for the Magnificent Piazza outside some Peter's in Rome who came to France to do some building work for the Sun King for Albany knees acknowledged mastery Louie just didn't like his designs they were too flowery to baroque just too Italian between the two of them there could be no loss of face it was all smiles but as soon as Bernini was out the door it was instead the Italian was offered the consolation prize of making a bust of the king and this is it despite Louie's reservations about the great Italian he's made rather a handsome job of this hasn't he the billowing locks the wind caught drapery suggests the king as a man of action his thousand-meter gaze representing leadership authority his eyes are slightly larger than natural to emphasize that it said that Bernini left a tiny accurate wart at the tip of that proud Borbon nose but I must say I can't detect it perhaps some slavish courtier went round after the Italian left with the sandpaper and removed it Benigni returned to rome irritated by his treatment at the hands of the haughty versailles courtiers nevertheless he set to work on a swaggering equestrian portrait of louie when it finally arrived at versailles the king hated it so much he relegated it to the farthest corner of the gardens where he wouldn't have to look at it poor Bernini never really won the seal of Louie's approval manicured evergreens classical statues magical grows elegant fountains the palace was spectacular but the gardens of Versailles had the crowned heads of Europe turning green with envy visitors couldn't wait to see them the green-fingered wizard responsible for all this was a man called Andre Lenora one of a long line of sons of the soil despite his humble origins he was a big favorite of the Kings and whenever Louie had been away from their Sai for a while he could always count on a big hug from his gardener the Sun King once offered Leonora his own coat of arms the sort of honor other people at court could only dream about but the gardener modestly replied that's all right your majesty I already have one three slugs crowned by a lettuce leaf despite his humility what he achieved in the gardens here was remarkable spectacular vistas stretched as far as the eye could see Lenora employed up to 30,000 laborers at a time to tame a once malarial swampland and create an earthly vision of paradise geometrically precise gardens boasted species both practical and exotic one plant far for beguiled the king the orange tree he was intoxicated by its scent enchanted by its flowers Lenora established this Orangery in the shelter of airside and he somehow contrived to have orange trees in flower every month of the year the finest of them were taken into the chateau where their perfume filled the Royal Apartments Linares gardens were the absolute expression of an absolute monarchy immaculately shaped perfectly clipped here was nature utterly subjected to the will of the king [Music] to improve the view from the palace Louie called into being a vast grand canal complete with its own fleet of scale model French warships but supplying water for the canal as well as two and a half thousand fountains plus the domestic needs of Versailles residents was a monumental challenge for years the king's engineers labored on one ambitious scheme after another diverting streams draining lakes building dams it just wasn't enough one engineer made an outrageous suggestion why not divert the Mighty River Seine itself five miles to the north this place is the closest the river seine comes to Versailles but in order to divert it to the palace itself Royal Engineers first had to lift it to the top of that hill over there that's an elevation of a hundred and sixty two meters but they weren't gonna let a little thing like that put them off on the banks of the Seine the engineer's built a vast pumping station once dubbed the 8th wonder of the world 14 giant water wheels powered 221 hydraulic pumps which forced water uphill through a series of pipes till it reached a monolithic stone structure looming over the landscape it still looms today an abandoned reminder of the Sun Kings hubris way it worked was this the waters of the Seine were pumped up here through this gully into this well here and up through this structure to the aqueduct above and from there they would have girdled and splashed all the way to Versailles and lapped against the very shoes of the king himself this was just one part of an astonishing engineering achievement a vast network of aqueducts and pipes a hundred and twenty miles of them in total all funneling the wet stuff to their side and full pelt the fountains alone used more water than the entire city of Paris over five million gallons a day but the truth is all that engineering genius was never quite enough to meet the demand in the end the gardener's just turned the fountains off when the King wasn't looking [Music] Louise rein wasn't always secure as a boy king he nearly lost his crown to a bunch of rebellious Nobles which probably explains why the adult Louie kept a vice-like grip on the tiller of government he's modestly supposed to have said they toss him wha I am the state he wasn't far wrong by 1689 the king had relocated the entire business of government from Paris to Versailles if you were a minister or Noble who didn't want to be left out in the cold there was only one thing for it get a room as close to the heart of power as you possibly could somewhere off the maze of corridors the long gallery here was one of the great thoroughfares of Versailles every door seemed to open onto a private world at all hours of the day or night this was a teeming anthill of servants courtiers aristocrats those who could afford to preferred not to walk and were carried instead and so at times the scene here resembled a demolition derby of sedan chairs even if you were on the waiting list it could take you years to get in you had to wait till someone was thrown out or died that allowed everyone lower down the pecking order to shuffle up but beware even if you've got a room you might languish in obscurity for years a place at Versailles was to die for literally impoverished heiress toes faded away to nothing up here in their overcrowded rookeries underneath the eaves one poor discarded Duchess abandoned by her husband was moldering away up here when somebody in the immediate royal circle decided what they needed was a maid of honor she was sent for trapped down her life was transformed was the old girl bitter about the way she'd been treated not at all a girl's got to eat [Music] at last the king had all the great and good of France exactly where he wanted them anyone who didn't live in the gilded cage didn't count though he liked to think he ran an open palace he said if there's anything singular about the French monarchy it's the free and easy access which subjects have to their prince in reality the guards had clear instructions to keep the riffraff out and there was a rigorous system of entrees the better your entree the closer you could get to the king's private chambers it nearly this is the Mount Everest of our social climbing the Kings bedchamber itself but wait a minute you could still undo all your hard work with a careless rasp but the knuckles on the woodwork no believe it or not the way to gain admission was to scratch ever so lightly with the nail of the smallest finger on your left hand and wait to be admitted and it said that here at Versailles the fashionable grew that nail extra long to show that they were amongst the privileged few [Music] noe was never alone in the Royal bedroom and I'm not just talking about after lights-out he turned this most intimate of royal places into a highly theatrical and hierarchical grand stage of court ritual so near and yet so far we're in the wrong chamber practically within touching distance of his majesty but some of us must remain forever beyond this cordon sanitaire it's like a velvet rope in a nightclub even if your access all areas backstage laminated pass was good enough to get you here right beside the King's bed one last hurdle one nightmare of social etiquette awaited you which chair to choose would you take the attractive armchair or perhaps the stool should you take a chair at all you were expected not to sit down before your social betters and if you pick the wrong type of furniture you might just as well have sat on the electric chair because it meant social death [Music] the best job at Versailles was the one that got you in here one of the gentlemen of the bedchamber they dressed his majesty in the morning and undressed him at night ridiculously only the most senior person present could hand the king his shirt so if successively important people entered the room His Majesty just had to wait as his outfit was passed from one pair of hands to the next among the lucky few who got to dress the king in his bedroom every day was a man whose influence would shaped courtly fashions throughout Europe the Royal hairdresser George be named George Bonet was a specialist in wigs a man so dedicated to furnishing a luxurious Barnet for Louis that he once vowed I would strip every head in the kingdom bald in order to adorn that of his majesty he was if you like the barber of civility until the mid-1600s men wore wigs out of necessity often because syphilis caused their hair to fall out louis xiv problem was hereditary baldness which he hid with a modest weave but with encouragement from his wig maker Binet the king's hair would reach phenomenal lengths or rather heights thanks to Louie big hair on blokes became the must-have accessory in upper-class France professional cutters scoured the land buying up human hair it took 50 heads of hair to furnish a royal wig today most toupees a machine made in a matter of hours but Marie Charlotte keihan an expert in creating louis xiv wigs for the theater still uses the same painstaking method they employed 400 years ago so that's real hair we can you explain what you're doing there hello a building on probation dong Xue Shan Shan the fair avec le cheval new show de Julho ski Dunlop erection a low and - Li - someone plotting the Jamaican taymiyah prepare sonic similar lounge do two locks on fatal epoch Paula basil is releaseed laputan to dunk a Polish fudanjuku City Swedish furniture hell well entre concho Valley so how long will this take you do you think it was like individuals prefer envelop completes from Portland goldish group a pompous little city what is this over here looks like you've trapped an animal or something in there very Charlotte in Canada Luke le box a existed Assad in convexity Du Bois avec de piqi an effete Milledgeville an Ontario por nada de Beauvoir pawn or mesh Parmesh continent lots a on streets ' fake on apado the New Age professor professor poet Hawaii inevitably I've agreed to be fitted with a louis xiv wig a suit if I'm lucky it won't come with any 17th century problems such as dust fleas splitting headaches throbbing boils that's interesting I feel a strange surge of power and authority coursing through me don't like it I'll take it everyone at court understood the importance of clothes to the Sun King he adored the finest fabrics the grandest of designs not just on himself but on everyone around him to His Majesty would often demand that the entire court was Rika 'td in the latest expensive Couture and he insisted you pay for it yourself to the ruin of several Nobles historian Fabrice Conan is an expert in the fashions of Louise Court stockings Douglas and how vital it was that you dressed to show off your social status [Music] beginning of course with the underwear that's perfect in an age of dangerous waterborne diseases regular bathing was deeply unpopular instead spotless underwear showed you cared before it is very important to challenge you shirt two or three times a day because people saw that when you are changing shirt you are clean because all the dirt is on the shirt and that's why in the suit you can see the laces you seek so some parts white part and it's a way to show that you have someone very important and that should take care so a very white shirt as you you have fits each one it's really perfect next comes the 17th century forerunner of today's three-piece suit part 1 the pantaloons part 2 the waistcoat so this is typical of the 17th century because it's very long and it came shorter at the at the 18th century and have worn this somebody a high rank alright Oh each man have to wear this and it will change as if it's of you you're wrong you watch yeah you will be half more ornaments more gold more silver or diamonds okay shall we oh yeah yeah I can see it would give you a certain swagger mmm is this all fastened up yes you have to fast I was afraid to say that serves as parts may prove very wrong it is quite that's your understood with a gentleman of dress by himself no never never that's it okay what's the idea with the lace why why wear lace the more layers you have the richest you are so at the beginning of the time of whistle 14 they were very very large laces covered Lance's and became a bit shorter later so let me go like okay and I fold with a 14 okay put here not too tight for free so you have to suffer to be a royal hey that's nice and now the piece de resistance yes yes yes it's in velvet and embroidered and it's a richest it is it of course and nicest to have at the court very look like this it fit perfectly do you think yes it's what's done for you well I might not be ready for the court but I'm ready for the pant oh all these dainty feet need now are shoes but not just any shoes so you see we have the winds already heels we don't know why they appeared at the court some people said that Louisa 14 was back from a party in Paris and he walked in the street and it was in front of a butcher's shop and there is some there were some blood and he walked on the blue Danny arrived like this at the court and everyone and everyone Tudors later thought it was fashion in fact we don't know we don't know but all the people at Versailles and this red red heels naturally okay if you please yeah didn't have stockings on it's like oh yeah that's it here comes that wig again we fix a head [Music] and a sword to prove I'm a member of the nobility finally the icing on the GAT owed upon your head if there's still room up there thank you very much for Bruce [Music] if you are going to be spending any time at all in the Royal presence you'd be well-advised to lay off the liquids beforehand the King had no tolerance of anybody else's physical weaknesses and Versailles wasn't particularly well endowed with comfort facilities indeed it wasn't unknown for a noble to knit behind a pillar when emergency pressed the King had the same control over his bladder as he did over everything else in France and woe betide the courtier who asked permission to relieve himself round here the Royal we was seldom heard the worst thing is to be caught in a coach with the king yes it was a first-rate opportunity to bend a royal ear but on the other hand if you didn't have superhuman control over your bodily functions you were in big trouble one Duchess described a journey she made with the king as the most horrific of her life she realized quite early on that she needed a comfort stone but that was out of the question so the poor woman knitted her legs together for six count them hours there was the exquisite torture of the refreshment of his profit to her which he had to sit several times she came close to blacking out completely when at last they reached their destination she only narrowly avoided an embarrassment by making a mercy dash for the nearest chamberpot the King had the same intolerance of any symptom of illness even pregnancy irked him perhaps this is the origin of the phrase a right royal pain [Music] the Duke dasar semen was the courtier who got it all wrong try as he might to grovel to the king he was forever putting his foot in it embarrassing faux pas hot-headed outbursts generally irritating his majesty and so getting short shrift luckily for us in his final years Saruman took bittersweet revenge by writing his memoirs the most revealing account we have of life at Louise Court he first met his majesty when he was just 16 his own father propelled him through the mob into the presence of the king it was a taste of what was to come because it wasn't a terrific moment as he later recorded in French of course the King thought me puny and delicate looking and said that I was still exceedingly young sassy more clung on at Versailles by his fingertips constantly scuffing his own chances of promotion take the time he slipped away on an unauthorized pleasure trip was spotted by the Kings spies and got a royal dressing down for his pains his career was a soufflé that stubbornly failed to rise by the end of his account it's clear that sir Seymour has become jaded and cynical and fed up with the routine at court on the other hand he's very clear-eyed about what it was that Louis most sought in his courtiers praise or better adulation pleased him so much that the most fulsome was welcomed and the most servile even more delectable that's what gave his ministers so much power for they had endless opportunities of flattering his vanity especially by suggesting that he was the source of all their ideas and had taught them all that they knew falseness civility admiring glances combined with a dependent and cringing attitude above all an appearance of being nothing without him were the only means of pleasing him [Music] in one respect the Kings unbridled vanity was justified he was a beautiful mover he famously performed the role of the Sun god Apollo in a ballet designed to remind everyone from whence their son John Louis made dance a vital talent for anyone wanting to get on if you were a member of court you're expected to attend dances they were important social occasions at which your accomplishments could tell others a lot about your breeding and refinement with the help of my trusty baroque shoes I'm following in the footsteps of all those Versailles courtiers who sought to ition in the essential art of movement at small steps dance expert edict Lalaji begins by teaching me how to walk with grace and confidence I was a brave officer or if I was a writer or something like that but my deportment was poor that would be a problem for me oh yes really because you have to look like your steady in fact they taught dance in the army to make them very strong in the legs and to know how to control their body and to be fast in the chair now I must learn the dance steps of the minuet a popular little number at court the rhythm of the moon read step is one step forward you have plie and envy yay LV on your toes first step and three little step on your toes up up up down heels to here down to here then three step on your toes and then plie plie heels together like I said oh yes you did show me that you can hold my hand Oh lovely thank you and one step and three little steps maybe we need some music yes what do you think I think though and now for a performance that would impress the Sun King himself when do we go I would tell you [Music] it's pitfalls snow first because money L was not happy there well I'm happy I'm just not very quick no okay so then we were very so we were gonna walk I'm talking you held us back to smart wave big wave very good but you've done this before I sense no ready no to bus no Oh mom you better when you go back let's go back better and I'm better going back [Music] well I enjoyed that yes look thank you for the dance oh it's what's my pleasure louis xiv adored music so much so he had a gaggle of musicians following him around almost everywhere he went he filled Versailles with The Sound of Music today faithfully recreated by the company Barak and the man who created the Versailles sound was Lewis court composer jean-baptiste Lully [Music] - smoothly was actually Italian along giovanni battista but the King didn't seem to mind that's because Lily was so keen on all things France he begged the King to give him full citizenship and in return Lily helped to define what it meant to be French the impressive lille penned new works for his majesty every single day he saw to it that europe's most fashionable baroque music was no longer italian but french stately and elegant like the sun king himself [Music] Louise rein was a golden age for French music producing star composers like the vial player Marin Marais organist and harpsichordist Francois Cooper oh and the prolific mark on Walsh our Ponty a whose tedium is cherished today as the theme of the Eurovision Song Contest [Music] if the king embodied the entire nation then what nourished his body was important to at their side there was an army of cooks his job was to provide regular banquets fit for a king the public could stand and watch and inhale as Louis sated his legendary appetite with dozens of dishes this was the birth of oak cuisine as we know it the classic French melange of rich creams sauces and meats fish - brought fresh to the Royal table was given the fancy treatment the king's most talented chef Francois Patel discovered the horror of getting it wrong during a weekend of feasting in the countryside poor old Vidal the prince of cooks as he was known met a fishy end he laid a sumptuous banquet for the king in his party in the woods at shanti the smell of roasting meat commingled with the bouquet of Narcisse i everybody had a terrific evening apart from the poor cook himself they ran out of meat not thank God at the Kings table no at the 25th table all the same you saw this as a grave blot on his reputation he'd ordered fish for the next day but where were they the puasa hadn't arrived convinced that his honour would be ruined Bartel retired to his quarters he took his sword embraced it against the back of the door and thrust it three times into his chest fatally wounding himself [Music] the next morning the fish turned up and everybody agreed it was a most delightful luncheon [Music] the king enjoyed the pleasures of the flesh and every one of his mistresses worked her charms he took his satisfaction wherever he could so as long as you were female and had a pulse you had a fair chance of bedding the boss little louise de la Valliere was youthful and pretty and distracted from her flat chest with plenty of frills and laces by contrast the witty atthenes de Montes pan had long blonde hair a pouting mouth and an impressive cleavage courts Donna Marie font or she was said to be as beautiful as an angel and as stupid as a basket and the formidable matronly Francois as de matin all tried to tame the rapacious moneth this is the marble court at the very heart of Versailles and the Kings complicated love life is written into the very architecture of the place the Queen was ensconced in her quarters here the Kings apartments including the all-important bedchamber behind me and over here was where the mistress d'Azur was put up now Louie and his mistress like to oversee the comings and goings in the court to comment and titter about them another even more wry bald noises escaped those upper windows small wonder courtiers came to dread passing beneath them and referred to it as facing the firing squad charming your way into the position of official mistress when you untold privileges and favors but make no mistake when the king was feeling frisky he'd better not complain about mal de tete or he'd grab the nearest chambermaid instead yet one of Louie's favorite paintings has a strange double meaning for a man so driven by carnal pleasures the obvious subject matter was King David playing the harp well Louie was a lover of a patron of the arts particularly music so that flattered him but the work also spoke to the inner man in Louie after all King David is raising his eyes in supplication to the almighty for forgiveness over his affair with Bathsheba and adulterous liaison not for the first time I think the king was having it both ways when he got up in the morning he could look at this picture and either being gorged with vanity at the idea of his musical prowess or else shriven with remorse depending on what he'd been up to the night before [Music] the year was 1666 the Royal mistress of the day was a Ernesto Montes pan a ravishing beauty with a razor-sharp wit put a spell on you [Music] for a time the charms of atthenes worked perfectly the king was spellbound and made her his new official mistress all too soon though she began to fear the king Glee I was roving again so she took unorthodox action she consulted a maker of spells a sorceress and her name was Madame who wasn't Madame Wazza was a witch who counted many important people amongst her clients but none close to the king than atthenes we can imagine the usually vivacious mistress secretly slipping away in a carriage to visit Madame Wazza at her home in a quiet Parisian backstreet this row of houses stands on the site of the sorceress Lavoisier's home it was an elegant villa set in substantial grounds and it was here she practiced her satanic arts including abortions and black magic rituals many residents of Versailles came to buy voise as famously poisonous concoction of arsenic and lead to help rid them of some rival at court but the King's mistress at an Ace was here for something else a love potion that would help reinforce her hold on the Kings affections in a Parisian herbalists historian Eve bruja is about to reveal exactly what Madame Voisine was brewing up for atthenes could you show me a love potion today is it legal what a fate I push you off a de la fuerza to compose it wha well the Catherine radium law reform young lady I take the side of the head don't kill folly be easy to prove any possible to petite Conchita bask in the valley Parker what persona para and said the event having the volume a extraordinary kana pleasures two new layer for sacra you see a Buddha so Sierra and was it hidden in his food was that the idea we because she don't suddenly to you and I wanna do see a mag radio and it's possible a teacher and you running an email so she said like entire incident detection moosh prequel New Year soon order Spanish flag in whether an exam play or just read off a TFA about the contender econom energy on fete they put whatever the Spanish flag it a consider a come and exit on sexual absolutely no considerably a word sexual what was it an exit on a no an exciter sexual exciter okay well I guess that's a whole lotta resonant gel abortion or gender cesium sectors answer AC Judique in Dakota's I mean is released at ashes on ammo we have Amy or calico aha don't know whole packet we have a heavy if you read a priapism absolutely not consider up dot in the para vivir Astra DiBiase since the polymer fiscal mentally insane you know decima Killam neon faith despite being event was here McGrady on is almost killed in the Department of Oaxaca year plus almost really a fan of a colony me a dodo named death of the video our receivers on walk in the park yes in fact is plural Constitution in other words a perfect Bellagio avoir as UT Kathy a McGrady os8 angry do a theta to put him off so Conservancy donor ago a create a hybrid ed an aphrodisiac extra memory so they Deezy because that model go at a do Tom Preece aphrodisiac can have a taker T V opt GB now will pour Daily Show a cancer movie despair many party this is big voodoo isn't it have you used this on anybody Jemmy really me Oprah pathetically see his room the love potion seemed to do the trick because the King's mistress noticed a distinct improvement in the Royal bedroom department unfortunately things were about to unravel the her sorceress friend Madame voise an in 1679 Paris police were investigating a string of suspicious deaths they uncovered a widespread use of poison in French high-society la voix zan was named as one of the chief suppliers along with several other dealers in poison she was tortured tried and hanged this wonderful lurid engraving of the period shows how the story of love was an was seized upon by a scandal hungry public it describes her as source of so much evil cursed creature who by a thousand poisons has destroyed nature she's seen here with demonic forces gathering about her on the right here death himself with his sharpened scythe and over on the left the three fates about to sever the cord of her wretched life to begin with the king was fully behind the inquiry he wanted to get to the bottom of this whole terrible affair but then word began to circulate that one of the people caught up in it was none other than his own beloved mistress what to do well the king of course did what he always did and acted to suit himself he simply shut the inquiry down suppress the evidence relating to his favorite courtesan and sure enough she was safe small matter that by then 36 people had already paid with their lives for this sorry business [Music] for years the king had inflicted exquisite torture on the court most of them were banned from sitting in his presence now though he was facing karmic comeuppance his normally strong Constitution failed him for once and he developed a ticklish complaint that made sitting down into an ordeal Louie developed an embarrassing and very painful anal fistula a past filled abscess that just wouldn't go away the Kings physicians tried a range of treatments enemas soothing poultices and various herbal concoctions without success [Music] the king got so fed up with his physicians that he ordered his barber to cut the abscess out instead in those days barbers performed surgery but it was a drastic throw of the dice the operation would be performed without anaesthetic and there was a high chance the patient wouldn't survive as for the poor barber shall Francois Felix well he was terrified but you didn't say not to his majesty monsieur felix set about redesigning the tools of the trade to create something that might improve his chances of success the Paris Museum of Medicine still houses the original instruments designed by Louis barber and this is what the fiendish imagination of Monsieur Felix came up with to solve the agonizing problem of the royal fundament he designed a retractor and a scalpel now the retractor would be inserted into a delicate and throbbing part of the royal anatomy and then gently like the petals of a flower opened up so that the surgeon could see what he was doing the historical record is a bit patchy as to where Monsieur Felix came up with the idea for the scalpel and this eye watering the long blade but I like to imagine that he was settling down to a plate of his favorite escargot of an evening still turning this problem over in his mind when grappling with a particularly truculent snail inspiration struck him before he turned to the Royal bottom seventy-five other lesser posteriors were brought before him on the slab so he could experiment with these devices his Majesty went under the blade without a whimper or a murmur against all the odds the OP was a great success the king was well and happy again he showered his lucky barber with venison's with honors and titles and riches and the operation itself became the must-have procedure in fashionable Paris it was the Botox of its day it was known as the Royale and fashionable people would say to each other have you had a Royale I hear she's had a Royale [Applause] throughout Louie's rain it was his portrait painters who projected the powerful Sun King image to the wider world he a South Rigo who made his name painting all the knobs at Versailles was the artistic spin dr. Peric solos in [Music] 1701 rego was confronted with a challenge to paint the aging Louie without diminishing his glory [Music] his Majesty was by now clearly no spring chicken but rego manages to combine a jolly accuracy with a noble almost godlike demeanor and look at the legs on that not bad for 63 no wonder Louie declared this his official state portrait his image for the ages this was the original painting where the eyes followed you round the room because you dint take your eyes off it it was forbidden to turn your back on this likeness of the king just as it was against the rules to show your back to his majesty himself whenever he was away from court this full-length portrait hung in the throne room in his place facsimile zuv it were carried in processions in the provinces like effigies of martyrs or saints it was less a work of art more a feat of transubstantiation It was as if the ineffable presence of His Majesty himself that somehow permeated the oil and the canvas Louie lived to be one of the longest reigning monarchs in history 72 years and a hundred and ten days on the throne his was a time of unparalleled glitter and spectacle he wanted his court to reflect his glory there were endless entertainments lavish displays of fountains fireworks and feasting in the terrible winter of 1709 when most of France starved from famine Louie decreed the party should go on at Versailles Louie created a court like no other it was made to serve Him and France though of course in his mind they were one and the same a project of such dazzling all-consuming narcissism couldn't possibly last the kings of France would live on at Versailles for a hundred years until history blew up in their faces taking them right along with it [Music]

Channel: Absolute History

Views: 588,323

Rating: 4.8363085 out of 5

Keywords: timeline, history documentary, documentary history, royalty, royal history, peasants revolt, bbc documentary, louis xiv, louis xiv documentary, the sun king louis xiv documentary, french royal family, french royalty, baroque music, Versailles, versailles documentary, paris history documentary, palace of versailles, palace of versailles tour, palace of versailles documentary, stephen smith history, sun king, king louis xiv, the sun king

Id: dNM-4tZNwNs

Length: 59min 20sec (3560 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 18 2020