1.
House of Rohan
–
The House of Rohan is a French noble family of viscounts, later dukes and princes, coming from the locality of Rohan in Brittany. Their line descends from the viscounts of Porhoët and is said to back to the legendary Conan Meriadoc. Through the Porhoët, the Rohan are related to the Dukes of Brittany and they developed ties with the French and English royal houses as well, and played an important role in France and European history. Alain I de Rohan, son of the viscount of Porhoët, was the first to take on the name of Rohan, the main branch of the family became extinct when Jean II died childless in 1638, his title and possessions passed on to the cadet branch of Rohan-Gié. When the first duke of Rohan, Henri II de Rohan-Gié, died, his title and this created the Rohan-Chabot lineage, which was not really a branch of the Rohan family. Rohan-Gié, extinct 1638 Rohan-Soubise, extinct 1787 The family of Rohan has a documented history. Spanish Royal Genealogy, Henri Vanoene The Rohan-Chabot family in Josselin Marek, Miroslav
2.
Rue des Francs-Bourgeois
–
Rue des Francs-Bourgeois is one of the longer and more interesting streets in the Marais district of Paris, France. Starting near Centre Georges Pompidou, the road is considered trendy, rue des Francs-Bourgeois is one of the few streets which largely ignores Frances strong tradition of Sunday closure, even within Paris. As such, it is a location for weekend brunches. Notable buildings include the ancient hôtels Carnavalet, Lamoignon, Sandreville, dAlbret, dAlméras, Poussepin, de Coulanges, Hérouet, de Jaucourt, de Fontenay, de Breteuil, hôtel Carnavalet houses the museum of the history of Paris. The street was known as rue des Poulies. In 1415, a noble called le Mazurier offered the Chief Prior of France a huge mansion with 24 bedrooms to receive 48 poor people. These people were so poor that they didnt pay the taxes of the city, in 1868, the street was joined with rue neuve Saint-Catherine and rue du Paradis au Marais
3.
Manor house
–
A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The term is loosely applied to various country houses, frequently dating from the late medieval era. They were sometimes fortified, but this was intended more for show than for defence. Manor houses existed in most European countries where feudalism existed, where they were known as castles, palaces. Many buildings, such as schools, are named Manor, the reason behind this is because the building was or is close to a manor house. The lord of the manor may have several properties within a county or, for example in the case of a feudal baron, spread across a kingdom. A large and suitable building was required within the manor for such purpose, generally in the form of a hall. This also gave the opportunity for the manor house to be cleaned, especially important in the days of the cess-pit. Thus such non-resident lords needed to appoint a steward or seneschal to act as their deputy in such matters, the day-to-day administration was carried out by a resident official in authority at each manor, who in England was called a bailiff, or reeve. Although not typically built with strong fortifications as were castles, many manor-houses were fortified and they were often enclosed within walls or ditches which often also included agricultural buildings. The primary feature of the house was its great hall. A late 16th-century transformation produced many of the smaller Renaissance châteaux of France, the Tudor period of stability in England saw the building of the first of the unfortified great houses, for example Sutton Place in Surrey, circa 1521. During the second half of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I and under her successor King James I the first mansions designed by architects not by mere masons or builders, began to make their appearance. Such houses as Burghley House, Longleat House, and Hatfield House are among the best known of this period, nearly every large mediaeval manor house had its own deer-park adjoining, emparked by royal licence, which served primarily as a store of food in the form of venison. Within these licensed parks deer could not be hunted by royalty and this gave them more privacy and space. Court was a suffix which came into use in the 16th century, the obvious origin of the suffix would appear to be that the building was the location where the manorial courts were held. True castles, when not royal castles, were generally the residences of feudal barons, the manor on which the castle was situated was termed the caput of the barony, thus every true ancient defensive castle was also the manor house of its own manor. The suffix -Park came into use in the 18th and 19th centuries, the usage is often a modern catch-all suffix for an old house on an estate, true manor or not
4.
Knights Templar
–
The order was founded in 1119 and active from about 1129 to 1312. The order, which was among the wealthiest and most powerful, became a favoured charity throughout Christendom and grew rapidly in membership and they were prominent in Christian finance. Templar knights, in their distinctive white mantles with a red cross, were among the most skilled fighting units of the Crusades, the Templars were closely tied to the Crusades, when the Holy Land was lost, support for the order faded. Rumours about the Templars secret initiation ceremony created distrust, and King Philip IV of France – deeply in debt to the order – took advantage of the situation to control over them. In 1307, he had many of the members in France arrested, tortured into giving false confessions. Pope Clement V disbanded the order in 1312 under pressure from King Philip, the abrupt reduction in power of a significant group in European society gave rise to speculation, legend, and legacy through the ages. The re-use of their name for later organizations has kept the name Templar alive to the modern day, after Europeans in the First Crusade recovered Jerusalem in 1099, many Christians made pilgrimages to various sacred sites in the Holy Land. Although the city of Jerusalem was under relatively secure Christian control, in 1119, the French knight Hugues de Payens approached King Baldwin II of Jerusalem and Warmund, Patriarch of Jerusalem, and proposed creating a monastic order for the protection of these pilgrims. The Temple Mount had a mystique because it was above what was believed to be the ruins of the Temple of Solomon. The Crusaders therefore referred to the Al-Aqsa Mosque as Solomons Temple, and from this location the new order took the name of Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, or Templar knights. The order, with about nine knights including Godfrey de Saint-Omer and André de Montbard, had few financial resources and their emblem was of two knights riding on a single horse, emphasising the orders poverty. The impoverished status of the Templars did not last long, another major benefit came in 1139, when Pope Innocent IIs papal bull Omne Datum Optimum exempted the order from obedience to local laws. This ruling meant that the Templars could pass freely through all borders, were not required to pay any taxes, with its clear mission and ample resources, the order grew rapidly. One of their most famous victories was in 1177 during the Battle of Montgisard, although the primary mission of the order was military, relatively few members were combatants. The others acted in support positions to assist the knights and to manage the financial infrastructure, the Templar Order, though its members were sworn to individual poverty, was given control of wealth beyond direct donations. A nobleman who was interested in participating in the Crusades might place all his assets under Templar management while he was away, based on this mix of donations and business dealing, the Templars established financial networks across the whole of Christendom. The Order of the Knights Templar arguably qualifies as the worlds first multinational corporation, in the mid-12th century, the tide began to turn in the Crusades. The Muslim world had become united under effective leaders such as Saladin, and dissension arose amongst Christian factions in, and concerning
5.
Germain Boffrand
–
Germain Boffrand was a French architect. A pupil of Jules Hardouin-Mansart, Germain Boffrand was one of the creators of the precursor to Rococo called the style Régence. His uncle, Philippe Quinault, introduced him to prospective clients among the aristocracy of Paris, in 1709, he was placed in charge of the interior apartments of the Hôtel de Soubise, where he soon succeeded the architect Pierre-Alexis Delamair. None of his early interiors survive, largely replaced by his spectacular Rococo work of the years following 1735, Boffrand was received by the Académie royale darchitecture in 1709. The following year he was among those employed in the additions to the Palais Bourbon, in 1732, he was appointed inspecteur général des ponts et chaussées and produced plans for restructuring Les Halles. He was a participant in the competition for the design of Place Louis XV, named chief architect to the hôpital général in 1724, he constructed in the Île de la Cité a foundling hospital, the Hôpital des Enfants Trouvés. Boffrand also worked for the hospitals at the Salpêtrière, at Bicêtre and he built a series of hôtels particuliers in Paris as speculative business enterprises. Boffrands pavilion of 1712-15 that inaugurated the new quarter of the Faubourg Saint-Honoré was purchased, abroad, Boffrand worked for the Duke of Lorraine, where he was appointed Premier Architecte to Duke Léopold in 1711, but little of significance remains. He also constructed a fountain and a hunt pavilion, Bouchefort, in the gardens of the schloss belonging to the Elector of Bavaria, in 1724 Boffrand worked on site at Würzburg with Balthasar Neumann, who had been consulting him in Paris, on the Prince-Bishops Residenz. His designs were carried out in the suite of rooms. Among the architects trained in his atelier were François Dominique Barreau de Chefdeville, Charles-Louis Clérisseau and Emmanuel Héré de Corny, Boffrands two sons collaborated in the office, both dying young, in 1732 and 1745. Boffrands folio, Livre darchitecture, was published in 1745, there are no surviving caches of his drawings. In January 1745 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, Germain Boffrand died in Paris in 1754 at age 86. The following commissions of Boffrand are largely taken from Fiske Kimball, Hôtel Le Brun,49 rue du Cardinal-Lemoine, for Charles II Le Brun, the nephew and heir of the premier peintre du roi Charles Le Brun and a relative of Boffrands. One of the first hôtels particuliers noted and commended by contemporary critics, remodelling of the Hôtel de Mesme. Remodelling of the Hôtel de Livry, Hôtel de Soubise,60 rue des Francs-Bourgeois, and the suite of interiors, Boffrands last major work and his masterpiece, for the prince de Rohan and his wife Marie Sophie de Courcillon. Façade of the Convent of Fathers of Mercy,45 rue des Archives, built for the prince de Soubise to provide a suitable sdtreet front opposite his new hôtel. Renovation for Anne Henriette of Bavaria, princess Palatine, widow of the Henri Jules, much of Boffrands decoration survives, including the staircase with its coved cornices filled with scrolls and foliage and rounded corners
6.
Rococo
–
Rococo artists and architects used a more jocular, florid, and graceful approach to the Baroque. Their style was ornate and used light colours, asymmetrical designs, curves, unlike the political Baroque, the Rococo had playful and witty themes. By the end of the 18th century, Rococo was largely replaced by the Neoclassic style. In 1835 the Dictionary of the French Academy stated that the word Rococo usually covers the kind of ornament, style and design associated with Louis XVs reign and it includes therefore, all types of art from around the middle of the 18th century in France. The word is seen as a combination of the French rocaille and coquilles, the term may also be a combination of the Italian word barocco and the French rocaille and may describe the refined and fanciful style that became fashionable in parts of Europe in the 18th century. The Rococo love of shell-like curves and focus on decorative arts led some critics to say that the style was frivolous or merely modish, when the term was first used in English in about 1836, it was a colloquialism meaning old-fashioned. While there is some debate about the historical significance of the style to art in general. Italian architects of the late Baroque/early Rococo were wooed to Catholic Germany, Bohemia and Austria by local princes, an exotic but in some ways more formal type of Rococo appeared in France where Louis XIVs succession brought a change in the court artists and general artistic fashion. By the end of the long reign, rich Baroque designs were giving way to lighter elements with more curves. These elements are obvious in the designs of Nicolas Pineau. During the Régence, court life moved away from Versailles and this change became well established, first in the royal palace. The delicacy and playfulness of Rococo designs is seen as perfectly in tune with the excesses of Louis XVs reign. The 1730s represented the height of Rococo development in France, the style had spread beyond architecture and furniture to painting and sculpture, exemplified by the works of Antoine Watteau and François Boucher. The Rococo style was spread by French artists and engraved publications, william Hogarth helped develop a theoretical foundation for Rococo beauty. Though not intentionally referencing the movement, he argued in his Analysis of Beauty that the lines and S-curves prominent in Rococo were the basis for grace. The development of Rococo in Great Britain is considered to have connected with the revival of interest in Gothic architecture early in the 18th century. The beginning of the end for Rococo came in the early 1760s as figures like Voltaire and Jacques-François Blondel began to voice their criticism of the superficiality, Blondel decried the ridiculous jumble of shells, dragons, reeds, palm-trees and plants in contemporary interiors. By 1785, Rococo had passed out of fashion in France, replaced by the order, in Germany, late 18th century Rococo was ridiculed as Zopf und Perücke, and this phase is sometimes referred to as Zopfstil
7.
Piano nobile
–
The piano nobile is the principal floor of a large house, usually built in one of the styles of Classical Renaissance architecture. This floor contains the reception and bedrooms of the house. The piano nobile is often the first or sometimes the second storey, located above a ground floor containing minor rooms, the reasons for this were so the rooms would have finer views, and more practically to avoid the dampness and odors of the street level. This is especially true in Venice where the piano nobile of the many palazzi is especially obvious from the exterior by virtue of its windows and balconies. Examples of this are Ca Foscari, Ca dOro, Ca Vendramin Calergi, larger windows than those on other floors are usually the most obvious feature of the piano nobile. Often in England and Italy the piano nobile is reached by an outer staircase. Kedleston Hall is an example of this in England, as is Villa Capra in Italy, most houses contained a secondary floor above the piano nobile which contained more intimate withdrawing and bedrooms for private use by the family of the house when no honoured guests were present. Above this floor would often be an attic floor containing staff bedrooms, in these instances, occasionally in museums etc. the principal piano nobile is described as the primo piano nobile to differentiate it. Though often found, this usage is potentially misleading, rooms in the piano nobile are always the grandest, the term is not used in Britain. This arrangement of floors continued throughout Europe for as long as large houses continued to be built in the classical styles and this arrangement was designed at Buckingham Palace as recently as the mid-19th century. Holkham Hall, Osterley Park and Chiswick House are among the innumerable 18th-century English houses which employed this design, Life in the English Country House. Harris, John, de Bellaigue, Geoffrey, & Miller, Oliver, English Country Houses, Early Georgian 1715–1760 London, Country Life. Pavilion Books Ltd. Kaminski Marion, Art and Architecture of Venice,1999, Könemann, ISBN 3-8290-2657-9 Masson, Georgina
