Seven Ages of Paris

Reviews

Washington Times: “Paris is what you bring to it, and Mr. Horne brings his broad erudition and intense feel for French history. He not only understands the political passions that made the city the inescapable center of France’s life…but more subtly, the poetry and music of the city’s air.”

New York magazine: “An authoritative thousand-year history; twenty-five years in the making.”

I’ve read and listened to this book more than once, and have finished rereading it in the lead-up to our election, as there are so many historical lessons that are relevant today, and I highly recommend it to any and all. I love it for the breadth and depth, for the historical value and the story-telling pleasures, the connection to our past, and how it enhances my appreciation of Paris. Also, because those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat its mistakes.

Maurice Druon, Académie Française, KBE, wrote in the Forward: “It was an English writer, Charles Morgan, greatly admired in my youth but now perhaps unfairly forgotten, who wrote, ‘France is an idea necessary for civilization.’” And “For all those lovers of Paris so numerous throughout the world, it will provide a generous source of reference, an exciting travelling companion – and, in the evening of life, a lullaby of nostalgia. Seven Ages of Paris is, in itself, a monument.…
“With every sound intuition, Horne dates the first great epoch of Paris from the reign of Philippe Auguste. Precocious genius in the art of power and a formidable medieval strategist, Philippe August was obsessed by the unity of the territory. In order to govern his kingdom firmly, he needed a vast, active and powerful capital which was solidly fortified. The same necessity imposed itself on his grandson, Saint Louis, himself obsessed by the unity of law, and upon Saint Louis’s own grandson, Philippe le Bel, who devoted his efforts towards the unity of the state. Those three rulers invented the nation, with its irreversible characteristics, and that centralization – based on Paris – which still marks France.
Allying his dedication to truth with a sense of the epic, it is at the pace of a cavalcade that Alistair Horne makes us journey through the centuries leading from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. From then on he wanders at a more leisurely speed. He is an apostle of factual history.”

The book begins with a Foreword by Maurice Druon, then a Preface, and a Note on Money. I read this on Kindle so am using numbers corresponding to where I’m quoting from, as opposed to using page numbers.

Introduction: From Caesar to Abélard
499 “As a teacher, Abélard’s intellectual fame rests on his introduction of logic and rationalism into the discussion of theology…writing in an era when the classical rationalism of Plato and Aristotle was just being rediscovered…’By doubting we come to enquiry, and by enquiring we pursue the truth,’ was his famous credo.”

Age One 1180-1314: Philippe Auguste. Essential if you’re interested in how Paris came to be.
523 Louis VI, also known as Louis Le Gros, had nine children. His first son died as a young man and the second son, also a Louis, became heir apparent. “There followed the great political coup of the fat King: the marriage of his new heir, Prince Louis, to Eleanor of Aquitaine.” Louis VI was stricken with dysentery shortly after their marriage and died in 1137 at the age of fifty-six. Louis VII became king at the age of 17 with the great benefits of a brilliant and beautiful wife, “a united kingdom, at peace with herself and abroad, sound finances and, above all, Abbé Suger.” Having read several books about Eleanor of Aquitaine, I don’t agree with all is subjective assessments but do agree with the author that she was “a formidable woman, intelligent and well read…perhaps the outstanding personality of her age.” Eleanor, Duchess of Aquitaine, was well-educated and wealthy in her own right as she’d inherited the enormous and bountiful territory of Aquitaine. Louis was extremely religious, even to the point of wearing hair shirts, and they were not well matched. They each petitioned the Pope to annul their marriage, said annulment being granted in 1152. Her subsequent marriage to Henry II of England led to “what French historians call the ‘first’ Hundred Years War.”

Age Two 1314 – 1643: Henri IV covers another pivotal time in the evolution of France. Henri IV was the first monarch of the House of Bourbon, coming from the cadet branch of the Capetian dynasty, and had been King of Navarre before ascending to this throne. He was a descendant of King Louis IX but raised as a Protestant in his mother’s faith. Following the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre of thousands of Protestants when he first married, the religious wars brought endless turmoil and he attempted to end that, and rebuild and modernize Paris. He famously said Paris was “well worth a Mass.” He converted and then passed the enormously important Edict of Nantes, which brought years of internal peace, in an effort to end the decades of religious wars that had plagued the country. Sadly, he was assassinated by a Catholic zealot outraged by such reconciliation and his son ascended to the throne at the age of 9, with mother Marie de Medicis as regent.

Age Three 1643 – 1795: Louis XIV covers another pivotal period in France’s history, including Death of the Ancien Régime. Many know of the Sun King but only for Versailles and his proclamation, “L’état, c’est Moi.” The lessons to be learned from his reign are especially relevant today.

Age Four 1795 – 1815: Napoleon has three parts. From Empire and Reform to “The Most Beautiful City That Could Ever Exist” to Downfall of an Empire. His accomplishments, strengths and weaknesses shaped France’s future, and that of Europe.

Age Five 1815 – 1871: The Commune covers Constitutional Monarchy and Revolt, The Second Empire, and L’Année Terrible.

Age Six 1871 – 1940: The Treaty of Versailles covers the Belle Époque, The Great War and The Phoney Peace.

Age Seven 1940 – 1969: De Gaulle covers The Occupation, “I Was France” and Les Jours de Mai.

Epilogue: Death in Paris – the Père Lachaise Cemetery closes out the book.

Location 8904:
“The Sorbonne of that time seemed to have changed little since the age of Napoleon. On returning in 1955 to the Sorbonne’s Faculty of Letters after twenty-seven years’ absence at American and English universities, Raymond Aron was deeply shocked by what he found:
‘What struck me most was the dinginess of the building and the institution. The chairs, in the tiny offices next to the lecture hall, could have come from the Flea Market. The rooms were grey, dirty, sad…The professor, for the most part, did nothing but deliver lectures.”
This was, sadly, still the case in terms of the buildings when I attended the Sorbonne. Elevators rarely worked (I started 1st semester on crutches, so was very aware of how often there was no working elevator in a bldg), and as to the rest of the buildings… I’ll never forget the bathrooms, which even when functional usually lacked both paper products and soap. However, the quality of teaching had improved significantly. I had some good to great professors in Paris, three were wonderful and I remember them fondly.

Jumping ahead to the end, I agree with the author that Père Lachaise is well worth a visit. The cemeteries impressive in many way. Be sure to wear your walking shoes.
Location 9239: One can visit the resting places of Molière and La Fontaine as well as “the painters Corot, Daumier, Géricault, David, Delacroix and Ingres…scientists and explorers: Champollion, the ‘Father of Egyptology,’ who began deciphering the Rosetta Stone in 1822; Antoine-Augustin Parmentier (1727-1813), the biochemist who introduced the potato to a reluctant France…” and where one can find “fresh geraniums always seem to adorn the tomb of Chopin, renewed year in and year out by some anonymous admirers.”