Questions about Les Invalides
Short answers, pulled from the story.
What is Les Invalides and what is it used for today?
Les Invalides is a complex of buildings in the 7th arrondissement of Paris containing museums, monuments, a hospital, and a retirement home for military veterans. It houses the Army Museum, the Museum of Relief Maps, the Cathedral of Saint-Louis-des-Invalides, and the Dome chapel, which holds the tomb of Napoleon Bonaparte. About a hundred elderly or incapacitated former soldiers still live there through the Institution Nationale des Invalides.
Who built Les Invalides and when was it founded?
Louis XIV ordered Les Invalides to be founded by a decree dated the 24th of November 1670, as a home and hospital for soldiers aged or disabled by his military campaigns. The first architect, Libéral Bruant, completed the enlarged complex by 1676, at which point the building contained fifteen courtyards.
Why is Napoleon's tomb located at Les Invalides?
A law passed on the 10th of June 1840 designated Les Invalides as Napoleon Bonaparte's final resting place. King Louis-Philippe I and prime minister Adolphe Thiers arranged the return of his remains from Saint Helena, a project known as le retour des cendres. The permanent tomb, designed by architect Louis Visconti and completed in 1861, holds a red quartzite sarcophagus resting on a green granite base.
How tall is the Dome des Invalides and what makes it significant?
The Dome des Invalides stands 107 metres tall, making it the tallest church building in Paris and taller than Notre Dame. Designed by Jules Hardouin-Mansart in 1676, it is considered one of the prime examples of French Baroque architecture. Its interior cupola contains a ceiling painting by Charles de La Fosse, completed in 1705, depicting Saint Louis presenting his sword to Christ.
Who else is buried at Les Invalides besides Napoleon Bonaparte?
Ferdinand Foch, who commanded Allied forces in World War I, was buried at Les Invalides in 1937 with a monument by sculptor Paul Landowski. The general Turenne was relocated there in 1800, and army captain Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle, author of La Marseillaise, lies in the Caveau des Gouverneurs beneath the Cathedral of Saint-Louis-des-Invalides. Eighty-two additional military figures rest in that underground gallery, including twenty-eight former Governors of Les Invalides.
What museums are located inside Les Invalides?
Les Invalides houses the Army Museum, formed in 1905 from the merger of the Artillery Museum and the Historical Museum of the Armies, with collections spanning from antiquity through the twentieth century. It also contains the Musée des Plans-Reliefs, a collection of three-dimensional scale models of fortified cities begun in 1668 under an order from the Minister of War of Louis XIV. Of roughly one hundred and fifty models produced between 1668 and 1870, twenty-eight are currently on display.