Spain and Versailles (2024)

Spain and Versailles

The seventeenth century was a time of strained relations between France and Spain, tensions which erupted into several armed conflicts. In 1661, Louis XIV wrote perspicaciously that :

The two crowns of France and Spain have now, and this has been the case for some time, achieved such a status in the world that it is impossible to raise one any further without driving down the other. This creates a sense of jealousy between the two which is, dare I say, essential. They exist in a state of perpetual enmity which treaties may cover up but never truly resolve, since the fundamental situation remains unchanged.

Although they were often at war, the two kingdoms were in constant diplomatic, economic and cultural contact, a relationship characterised by a blend of fascination and mistrust. Naturally, this tumultuous history has left its mark on the decoration and collections of the Palace of Versailles, which can help us to appreciate its importance.

Born on 5 September 1638, while France and Spain were at war (1635-1659), LouisXIV was of Spanish descent on his mother’s side: Anne of Austria was the daughter of King Philip III. He was thus a grandson of Henri IV and a great-grandson of Philip II. We should not exaggerate the importance of this Spanish heritage on the king’s education and tastes, but it is interesting to note that his mother ensured that he learned Spanish, a language which he thus spoke fluently throughout his life. Other traces of Hispanic influence can be detected in Louis XIV’s artistic interests: he was a fan of the guitar, and played the instrument himself; in his youth he read (or had read to him) Spanish novels including Cervantes’ Galatea, a work which was warmly received in France. He also exhibited, from an early age, a penchant for ornate decoration which did not escape those courtiers who had hoped for a greater sense of sobriety and grandeur from the young king. This taste for ostentation was roundly attributed to the influence of the Queen Mother. Above and beyond these somewhat anecdotal details, throughout his long reign Louis XIV was constantly required to contend with Spain, one of Europe’s leading powers and the centre of an empire which spread across the globe. The dynastic shift of 1700 and the widespread conflict which ensued finally brought two centuries of rivalry to a close, and created a new European order in the process.

The wedding of Louis XIV

In 1659, the Treaty of the Pyrenees marked - for a while, at least - the reconciliation of the two countries. Intense diplomatic negotiations resulted in major territorial concessions (the counties of Artois and Roussillon were ceded to France), as well as arranging for the marriage of King Philip IV's daughter, the Infanta Maria Theresa, to the young Louis XIV, her cousin on both sides . The young bride also brought with her the prospect of an immense inheritance, since at the time her father’s only heir was an infant son. This prestigious union between the two crowns was marked with suitably lavish celebrations. The event was considered to be of such exceptional importance that it forms the subject of not one but two scenes in the famous History of the King tapestry, woven at the Gobelins manufactory: the interview between Louis XIV and Philip IV on the Isle of Pheasants, in the middle of the Bidasoa River, and the wedding ceremony itself, held in Saint-Jean-de-Luz on 9 June 1660.

The War of Devolution

1667 - 1668

This hard-won peace did not last long. Tensions first began to show when a diplomatic incident occurred in London involving the French and Spanish ambassadors. Louis XIV demanded, and obtained, an official apology from Philip IV, accompanied by a promise to recognise the precedence of the Most Christian King’s ambassadors over his own at all the royal courts of Europe. This crushing victory on the bloody field of protocol became the subject matter of another tapestry ad majorem gloriam regis. It is also alluded to on the ceiling of the Hall of Mirrors, where an allegorical figure representing Spain, a woman in a red cloak accompanied by the heraldic lion of Castile, bows down to France.

Philip IV died in 1665. His widow, Maria Anna of Austria, oversaw the regency of their son CharlesII, then just four years old. Louis XIV seized this opportunity to lay claim to the Spanish Netherlands in the name of Maria Theresa. The War of Devolution, also known as the “War of the Queen’s Rights,” ended in 1668 with the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. France emerged victorious from the conflict, gaining a number of major cities in Flanders, including Lille and Douai, the latter of which witnessed a memorable ceremonial entrance by the royal couple in August 1667.

The Franco-Dutch War and its influence on the décor at Versailles

1672 - 1678

The hostilities recommenced a few years later with the Franco-Dutch War, in which Spain was allied with the Holy Roman Empire and the Dutch Republic. When the war finally came to an end, Charles II was required by the Peace of Nijmegen to hand over yet more territory to France, including Franche-Comté, conquered in 1674, and more fortified towns in Flanders. This war assumed a very particular status in the interior decoration of the new Palace of Versailles, where Louis XIV permanently transferred his court in 1682. The palace was filled with paintings and sculptures celebrating the king’s latest military successes, and this imagery became woven into the daily lives of the monarch and his court. The bellicose propaganda begins on the gates protecting the entrance to the palace, where sculpted figures evoke French triumphs over enemies represented by their heraldic symbols: the lion for Spain, and the eagle for the Holy Roman Empire. To the south, Victory over Spain was sculpted by Girardon between 1680 and 1682.

Inside the place, the military theme features heavily in the ensemble formed by the Hall of Mirrors and the War and Peace Rooms. The vast iconographic system developed by Charles Le Brun, under the watchful eye of Louis XIV, celebrates both the personal history of the king and his military triumphs in the Franco-Dutch War. The décor includes numerous allegorical depictions of Spain and her allies. On the ceiling of the War Room, Spain is seen in a threatening pose, surrounded by warriors and flanked by a rampant lion, all in the firing line of France’s majestic thunder.

In the Hall of Mirrors, which recounts the twists and turns of the war, Spain features in many of the grand set pieces: Splendours of France’s neighbouring powers, the Alliance of Germany and Spain with Holland, Spanish tactics disrupted by the capture of Ghent and Holland accepts peace and deserts Germany and Spain. In the Peace Room, an arch shows Spain accepting the terms of the peace. The latter scene shows the allegorical figure representing Spain, still accompanied by the heraldic, lion, accepting a proffered olive branch. Putti celebrate the restoration of peace, burning weapons or playing musical instruments (guitars and castanets) while a cornet player leads a folk dance.

In the gardens, the Grove of the Triumphal Arch houses the Fountain of France Triumphant, the sole surviving trace of the original grove, featuring an allegory of France crushing her enemies beneath the wheels of her chariot. Naturally, the Spanish lion is among the vanquished, alongside the imperial eagle. On the terrace running alongside the Water Parterre, directly in front of the palace’s grand façade, two colossal vases also commemorate the king’s victories: the War Vase (by Antoine Coysevox) and the Peace Vase (by Jean-Baptiste Tuby).

the Spanish Succession

1700

In 1660, Louis XIV’s new queen brought with her the possibility of a fabulous inheritance: she was the only surviving child of King Philip IV and Elisabeth of France. By 1660 the king had married again, to Maria Anna of Austria, but his only living heir was the Infante Philip, born in 1657, whose fragile health did not bode well for a long and successful reign. In fact the young heir died the following year, just a few days before the birth of the Infante Charles, the future Charles II. Given the circ*mstances, it was certainly tempting to speculate that the dynasty was at risk of extinction. If that risk were to become reality, the Queen of France would have a serious claim to the Spanish throne, as would her half-sister Margarita Teresa, who married the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I in 1666. Furthermore, Spain never paid Louis XIV the promised dowry of 500,000 crowns in return for his agreement to renounce any dynastic right to the Spanish throne, making this commitment null and void as far as France was concerned. It eventually became clear that Charles II would have no legitimate heir, as neither his first wife, Marie-Louise d’Orléans, Louis XIV’s niece and a source of great hope when she was married off to Madrid, nor his second wife Marie-Anne de Neubourg bore him any issue. The whole of Europe began to steel itself for the inevitable upheaval which would follow the demise of the last Habsburg King of Spain. What would become of the vast empire assembled by Charles V? Various potential scenarios for carving up the Spanish empire were explored from the late 1660s onwards, although Charles II did not finally give up the ghost until 1st November 1700, and not before signing a will which named the Duc d’Anjou as his sole heir. The news reached Louis XIV at Fontainebleau on 9 November. The very next day, he decided to accept the will. Back at Versailles he used his regular audience with the ambassadors to publicly announce the accession of Philip V to the Spanish throne, in the presence of the Spanish ambassador, the Marquis de Castel dos Rios. The scene took place in the King’s Apartments (which subsequently became the Council Chamber, following extension work by Louis XV). Louis XIV immediately decided to treat his grandson as a fellow sovereign, moving him to grander lodgings within the palace. After all, it would have been unseemly for the King of Spain to remain in his old apartment in the North Wing. Until his departure for Madrid, Philip V slept in the Mercury Room. He left Versailles on 4 December 1700, arriving in Madrid in January.

The royal collections at Versailles contain several works commemorating this event, “the greatest and most extraordinary scene which had ever occurred in Europe,” in the words of the Marquis de Sourches. An allegorical painting by Henri de Favanne (1704) shows Spain proffering the crown to the prince, watched on by Cardinal Portocarrero, one of the architects of Charles II’s decision to choose a French heir.

A vast historical piece by François Gérard, dated 1824, imagines a scene in which the Marquis de Castel dos Rios throws himself at the feet of his new king :

«Are the Pyrenees no more ? »

This phrase,attributed by the Mercure Galant to the Marquis de Castel dos Rios, was probably never actually spoken. Voltaire wrongly attributed it to Louis XIV himself. Nevertheless, the image was used at the time to express the radical shift in the relationship between France and Spain. The Marquis de Dangeau relates an episode in which the king invited a number of courtiers to accompany Philip on his journey south, with the ambassador remarking that the journey would be “easy, since the Pyrenees have now melted away.”

The ascent of Philip V to the Spanish throne was initially accepted by the other European powers, but the uneasy peace was soon shattered by some clumsy diplomatic errors on the French side and the pressing claims of the Archduke Charles (the future Emperor Charles VI, second son of Leopold I), who refused to accept Charles II’s will and proclaimed himself King of Spain, lighting the fuse on a new war which would rage until 1713. At the end of this war Philip V was confirmed as King of Spain and her colonies but was obliged to relinquish all of Spain’s European possessions: the Netherlands, Naples and Sardinia were handed over to the Austrians, while Milan and Sicily went to the Duke of Savoy.

Dynastic unions

18th century

Despite triggering an immensely damaging European conflict, the ascent of the Bourbons to the Spanish throne marked the beginning of a lasting peace between the two kingdoms. A new dynastic union was proposed, in the form of a marriage pact between the young Louis XV and his cousin the Infanta Mariana Victoria, as well as a second union between the latter’s brother Louis, the future Louis I of Spain, and the regent’s daughter Louise-Elisabeth d’Orléans. In keeping with tradition,the princesses were exchanged on the Isle of Pheasants. However, four years later the Duc de Bourbon, LouisXV’s most senior minister, sent the Infanta back to Spain on the grounds that she was still too young to marry. Bourbon was keen that the king should be married as soon as possible, in order to produce an heir and secure the future of the dynasty. Insulted by this snub, King Philip V sent the widow of his son back to France post haste. The erstwhile Queen of Spain ended her days in Paris, where she resided at the Luxembourg Palace. Twenty years later, by now at the head of a large family, Philip V agreed to marry another of his daughters, the Infanta Maria Theresa, to the Dauphin, the eldest son of LouisXV. The wedding, held at Versailles in February 1745, was marked by sumptuous celebrations.

The image of the Pyrenees melting away, coined some forty-five years previously, made a reappearance in the theatre set up specially in the arena of the Royal Stables to host the premiere of the Princess of Navarre, a comédie-ballet with music by Rameau and text by Voltaire. The climactic scene saw the Pyrenees disappear into the bowels of the theatre, to be replaced by the Temple of Love. Meanwhile the performers danced a series of four quadrilles, each representing one of the states now governed by the House of Bourbon: France, Spain, Naples and Parma.

In the 18th century, the Kings of France were members of a royal dynasty which also ruled over Spain and parts of Italy. One of the sons born to Philip V and Elisabeth Farnese, the future King Charles III, became Duke of Parma in 1731 and, in 1734, succeeded in conquering the Kingdom of Naples, granted to Austria in the peace treaties of 1713. His younger brother Philip took over as ruler of Parma. In 1739, Louis XV married his eldest daughter to the latter: Elisabeth, known by the nickname “Madame Infanta” at Versailles, thus became the duch*ess of Parma. One of her daughters, Marie-Louise, would later become Queen of Spain as the wife of King CharlesIV.

Barely a year and a half after their sumptuous wedding, the young Dauphine died suddenly at the age of twenty. The Dauphin was disconsolate, but was nonetheless obliged to marry another princess the following year, Maria Josepha of Saxony.

It would, however, be reductive to consider Franco-Spanish relations in the 17th and 18th centuries simply as a succession of diplomatic exchanges and dynastic alliances. There were also constant and fruitful commercial and cultural exchanges between the two kingdoms. Here in Versailles, we can detect traces of these exchanges and their lasting impact on the French court.

Etiquette and customs

The system of royal etiquette in place at Versailles differed from the model employed at the Spanish court. Some of the differences were striking: the accessibility of the monarch, the marks of respect required, customs etc. Nevertheless, the French court was not impervious to a certain number of subtle innovations originating on the other side of the Pyrenees. These new trends were often imported by Spanish-born queens. Queen Maria Theresa, for example, popularised the use of the carreau, a special cushion designed for use by ladies, already a common sight at the royal court in Madrid. Anne of Austria, her predecessor, retained her Spanish maids of honour for many years, and their names duly appear in the ledgers of the royal households. Maria Theresa was also credited with introducing hombre to the French court, a card game which proved to be a roaring success.

The coronation of Philip V opened up a new era in relations between the two courts. An agreement was rapidly reached to the effect that peers of the French realm would enjoy the same honours and privileges in Madrid as their Spanish counterparts, and in return the most senior Spanish aristocrats would receive the rank of “duke and peer” at Versailles, automatically conferring upon them certain highly-coveted privileges such as the right to drive their carriages into the Royal Courtyard, and, for the ladies, the right to use the stools reserved for duch*esses. Furthermore, the ambassadors of Spain, Naples and Parma were styled as “Ambassadors of the Royal Family,” receiving special treatment in all states ruled by a member of the House of Bourbon.

Fashion

French fashion was held in high regard across Europe, but was certainly not impermeable to foreign influences. Perfumes, make-up, furs, ribbons and lace imported from Spain became the height of fashion in France. Queen Anne of Austria and Queen Maria Theresa helped to popularise certain hairstyles, including the style known as “à la garcette,” whose name is derived from the Spanish word garceta.

French dressmakers created countless dresses and outfits “in the Spanish style,” whose Spanish pedigree often owed more to an imagined ideal of Spain than the realities of fashion in the Iberian Peninsula. The Marquise de Villars, who accompanied the young Queen Marie-Louise d’Orléans on her journey to Madrid in 1679, wrote home to dispel a commonly-held misconception in France: “Wearing black or wearing colour is not a matter of respect at all.” The association of the colour black with the King of Spain, which owed much to the portraits of Philip IV painted by Velasquez, was taken up by Hyacinthe Rigaud when Louis XIV commissioned him to paint the portrait of his grandson: the artist depicted Philip V dressed in black “in the Spanish style,” decked out in a golilla (flat collar) and carrying a taza sword, an accoutrement which had fallen out of use elsewhere in Europe but could still be seen at the royal court in Madrid. There was a resurgence of interest in Spanish style towards the end of the Ancien Régime period, with fashionable courtiers at Versailles sporting dresses inspired by 16th-century models.

Gastronomy

In terms of the culinary arts, Queen Maria Theresa introduced the court to the Spanish dish olla, soon known by the Gallicised name oille. This meat stew became a staple of the royal table, and the palace’s silver (and later porcelain) table services began to include sumptuously decorated oille dishes, a sign of just how thoroughly the recipe had been assimilated into French cuisine. The rare examples of royal menus which survive from Louis XV’s table at the Château de Choisy also attest to the dish’s enduring popularity, with each supper including two different types of oille. Variants included “Spanish oille with croutons,” “Oille à la Crécy,” “Oille with rice,” “Crawfish oille,” “Oille with Spanish onions” and more. Louis XIV’s queen was also credited with popularising the drinking of hot chocolate in France, a treat which had not previously been widely appreciated on this side of the Pyrenees, although Anne of Austria was also a daily consumer. On the strength of this noble endorsem*nt chocolate was now served in abundance at court soirées, although opinion on this new delicacy was split for many years.

Literature

Spanish literature was hugely popular in France, widely translated and emulated by French authors. Cervantes’ works were translated into French during his lifetime, with immediate and lasting success. Cervantes is present in all of the royal libraries, and Don Quixote provided the subject matter for one of the finest series of tapestries produced at the Gobelins royal manufactory in the 18th century.

Other authors, including Lope de Vega, also met with an enthusiastic reception from French readers. Mme de Sévigné herself exclaimed: ‘Es de Lope, es de Lope!’ as a compliment on the epistolary style of her cousin Bussy-Rabutin. Spanish theatre reached the French court by means of a troupe of players who arrived shortly after Queen Maria Theresa. They spent the next decade in Paris, introducing French audiences to their rich repertoire. Molière certainly had no objection to borrowing from these Hispanic sources, sometimes indirectly: El Marido Hace Mujer by Hurtado de Mendoza can be seen as a precursor to his L’École des Maris, while El Desdén con el Desdén by Moreto partly inspired La Princesse d’Élide (premiered at Versailles in 1664), and, of course, El Burlador de Sevilla by Tirso de Molina was a major influence on Don Juan. L’École des femmes, meanwhile, was inspired by Scarron’s translation of one of María de Zayas’ Novelas Amorosas y Ejemplares, entitled El Prevenido Engañato.

Architectural exchanges

From palace-monasteries to fountains

In France, faint echoes of the layout of the Escorial can be detected in François Mansart’s design for the Val-de-Grâce monastery, built in Paris under the patronage of Anne of Austria, as well as the Hôtel des Invalides, commissioned by her son.

At Versailles, on the other hand, Louis XIV blazed his own trail and created a royal residence whose scale and magnificence stunned Europe. Many of his fellow monarchs took a close interest in this sumptuous new palace, without seeking to slavishly imitate it. The accession of a French prince to the Spanish throne led to an influx of Gallic artistic and architectural influences on Spain’s royal residences (especially the Buen Retiro palace), although the reconstruction of the royal palace in Madrid, following the destruction of the old Alcazar by fire in 1734, looked more to Italy for inspiration than to France. However the royal palace of La Granja, and particularly its gardens, contain numerous references to the origins of the erstwhile Duc d’Anjou. The palace’s many fountains, designed and decorated by French artists, include some very direct imitations of the fountains of Versailles and Marly. Examples include an artificial waterfall which closely resembles the Rustic waterfall at Marly, a fountain showing Diana bathing whose general structure recalls the Water Buffet fountain at Le Trianon, fountains influenced by the famous Pyramid at Versailles (Fuente de las Tazas fountains) and still others inspired by the fountain of the Triumphal Arch (Fuente de las Ocho Calles). The Frog Fountain (Fuente de las Ranas), meanwhile, is directly inspired by the Latona fountain with its pyramidal composition, featuring Latona at the summit, presiding over successive tiers of Lycian peasants transforming into frogs.

The collections of the Palace of Versailles today

21^th century

Converted into a museum dedicated to “all the glories of France” by King Louis-Philippe in 1837, the Palace of Versailles is home to many works of art connected to Spain, its history and its relations with France. While this is not the place for an exhaustive catalogue of these works, it is worth mentioning a small handful of the paintings and artefacts which grace the galleries of the royal palaces of Versailles and Le Trianon. From ancient history through to the Napoleonic wars, the countless depictions of military actions reflect the nineteenth century taste for grand battle scenes. Examples include The Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212), painted by Horace Vernet for one of the rooms dedicated to the Crusades and showing King Sancho of Navarre in the thick of the action, The Battle of Rocroi (1643), in which the young Duc d’Enghien, the future Prince de Condé, won a famous victory over the Spanish forces commanded by Francisco de Melo. There are also a whole series of works depicting the troubled times of the Napoleonic occupation, such as the Capitulation of Madrid by Gros, the Episode from the Siege of Zaragoza, or the impressive Combat of Guisando by Lejeune. The Grand Trianon houses an imposing Sèvres porcelain vase commemorating the campaign of 1823 in which Louis XVIII lent his support to Ferdinand VII – an ill-fated intervention which only served to precipitate Spain’s descent into a period of severe turbulence – as well as two sections of the magnificent centrepiece presented by King Charles IV to Napoleon in 1808, crafted at the Buen Retiro porcelain manufactory. A number of paintings focus specifically on Spanish monarchs. Some use considerable artistic licence to imagine famous episodes from the state visit of Charles Quint to France in 1539-1540, including Francis I and Charles Quint visiting the tombs of Saint-Denis, by Gros (1837), and the Ring of Charles-Quint by Revoil (1810), currently hanging in the French embassy in Madrid. Others evoke the brief reign of Joseph Bonaparteand the reign of Isabelle II, including her wedding in 1846.

Last but not least, Versailles has played host to members of the Spanish royal family on several occasions, including the 1864 visit of Don Francisco de Asis, husband of Queen Isabella, and the state visit by King Alfonso XIII in 1905.

Raphaël Masson, Head Curator