Musée de l'Histoire de France (Versailles)

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[[File:La Galería de las Batallas.JPG|thumb|The ''[[galerie des Batailles]]'']]
[[File:Salle des Croisades Versailles.jpg|thumb|One of the ''[[salles des Croisades]]'']]

The '''''Musée de l'Histoire de France''''' (Museum of French History) is a museum that was created by [[Louis Philippe I|King Louis Philippe I]] in the [[Palace of Versailles]] and opened in 1837. At the time, it represented an ambitious project of national reconciliation between the hitherto competing narratives of the [[Kingdom of France|French monarchy]] and the [[French Revolution]], to which Louis-Philippe devoted significant personal attention. Whereas it gradually faded in importance as a museum in the later 19th century, its lavish [[Historicism|historicist]] decoration remains a major exemplar of the art of France's [[July Monarchy]].

==History==
[[File:Musée national du Château de Versailles fronton.jpg|thumb|The museum was dedicated "to all France's glories" in a spirit of national reconciliation]]

When Louis-Philippe became king in 1830 following the [[July Revolution]], the Palace of Versailles had been mostly unoccupied for more than 40 years and had fallen into disrepair. Louis-Philippe, who had a personal interest in history, decided in 1833 to repurpose the massive building for a non-residential use.<ref name=chateau></ref> His minister [[Marthe Camille Bachasson, Count of Montalivet]] was instrumental in the development of the museum project.

A number of new rooms and galleries were created by restructuring the palace's interior spaces and destroying a number of pre-existing apartments. The design was coordinated by architect , with help from [[Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine]] for the [[Galerie des Batailles]].Liquid error: wrong number of arguments (given 1, expected 2) The museum was inaugurated on with a lavish opening ceremony.<ref>Liquid error: wrong number of arguments (given 1, expected 2)}}</ref> The museum displayed artefacts formerly in other national collections, especially portraits of past monarchs and other historically significant individuals, as well as works specifically commissioned for it.

[[Victor Hugo]], who attended the inauguration, was appreciative of the project in his personal notes:<ref>Liquid error: wrong number of arguments (given 1, expected 2)}}</ref>


Further work was carried out to expand the museum under the [[Second French Empire]] in the 1850s and 1860s<ref name=chateau/> and in the early years of the [[French Third Republic|Third Republic]]. In the late 19th century, however, Versailles curator [[Pierre de Nolhac]] put emphasis on the restoration of the pre-revolutionary state of the palace, and dismantled some of the museum's arrangements.<ref>Liquid error: wrong number of arguments (given 1, expected 2)}}</ref>

The museum's rooms and collection are now managed by the [[Public Establishment of the Palace, Museum and National Estate of Versailles]] together with the rest of the palace and domains. Most of the corresponding galleries and exhibition spaces are not permanently open to the public.

==Galleries and collections==

Most of the paintings are kept in the [[attic]]s of the palace's North and South Wings.<ref name=chateau/> These exhibition spaces are complemented by several prestige galleries:
* the monumental ''[[galerie des Batailles]]'', occupying much of the South Wing's first floor, with 36 large-scale historical paintings and 82 busts of French military leaders who died in battle;
* the five [[salles des Croisades]], opened in 1843 on the North Wing's ground floor, celebrating the [[crusades]] as a specifically French endeavour (including [[Eugène Delacroix]]'s ''[[Entry of the Crusaders in Constantinople]]'', transferred to the [[Louvre]] in 1885 and replaced by a copy);
* the ''salle de 1792'', sole surviving one of several rooms dedicated to the [[French Revolution]];<ref></ref>
* the Empire Rooms on the South Wing's ground floor, on [[Napoleon]] and his military victories;<ref></ref>
* the ''salle de 1830'' commemorating the [[July Revolution]];
* the galleries of Africa, Crimea and Italy on the North Wing's first floor, glorifying the French involvement under Louis-Philippe in the [[French conquest of Algeria|conquest of Algeria]], the [[siege of Antwerp (1832)]] and the "[[Pastry War]]" with Mexico, as well as the later Second Empire's campaigns in the [[Crimean War]] and the [[Second Italian War of Independence]];<ref></ref>
* the ''galeries de pierre'', four long corridors (on the ground floor and first floor, in the palace's North and South wings) decorated with numerous sculpted busts of French historical figures.

With over 6,000 paintings and 3,000 sculptures, the museum's collections are the premier source of iconography on French history.<ref name=chateau/>

==See also==
* [[Musée des Souverains]]

==Notes==




[[Category:History museums in France]]
[[Category:Palace of Versailles]]
[[Category:July Monarchy]]

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