page_title: Château de Meudon
section_title: Louvois and his wife, Anne de Souvré (1679-1695)
hierarchical_section_title: Château de Meudon / History / Grand Siècle / Louvois and his wife, Anne de Souvré (1679-1695)
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Epouse en 1662 du ministre François-Michel le Tellier, Marquis de Louvois
context_page_description: Meudon Castle, also known as the Royal Castle of Meudon or Imperial Palace of Meudon, is a French castle located in Meudon in the Hauts-de-Seine department. At the edge of a wooded plateau, the castle offers views of Paris and the Seine river, as well as of the valley of Chalais. Located between Paris and Versailles, in the heart of a hunting reserve, the castle has an ideal topography for large gardens. It had many successive owners from the Renaissance until the fall of the Second French Empire. It should not be confused with the Bellevue Castle, also located in Meudon.
  Famous past residents include: Anne de Pisseleu d'Heilly, Duchess of Étampes; the Cardinal of Lorraine, Abel Servien; François Michel Le Tellier Marquis de Louvois, and Louis, Grand Dauphin, also known as Monseigneur, who linked the Chaville Castle to Meudon Castle. The Château-Vieux burned down in 1795 and was rebuilt as the Château-Neuf, which in turn burned down in 1871. Demolition was considered, but most of the castle was preserved and became an observatory with an astronomical telescope in 1878, it was then attached to the Observatory of Paris in 1927.
context_section_description: For the powerful minister, who called himself "M. de Chaville" in his youth, the site of Meudon was ideal, near both Versailles and the Chateau of Chaville, where the family property was located. It was rebuilt by his father, Michel Le Tellier. Louvois obtained the superintendence for the buildings in 1683, then embarked on a series of grandiose rearrangements. He enriched the façade of the chateau with busts and balconies on columns of gray marble. He sumptuously redecorated the whole interior. He had the woodwork installed in 1684. Above the doors were floral paintings in the style of Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer. A cabinet displayed miniatures of the groves of Versailles painted by Jean Cotelle the elder, doubtless a gift from Louis XIV in 1688 to thank his minister for the perfect completion of the marble Trianon de porcelaine. The large gallery, which occupies the entire right wing on the first floor, is adorned with twelve paintings by Adam Frans van der Meulen on the great battles of the reign.
  Nicodemus Tessin the Younger noted the following during his visit to the castle in 1687. 
  "In Meudon, I went with a Gascon gentleman (who drew all the views of ancient Egypt, named M. Le Cas) and with M. Silvestre...The most remarkable in the house was the ceiling painted in oils directly on the vault by M. de La Fosse. At the four corners of the composition, simulating stucco, two seated figures and two standing figures were painted: in the corners and between the statues, the ceiling was painted in oils directly on the vault by Charles de La Fosse. In the corners and between the statues there was something like an oeil-de-boeuf, through which the sky could be seen. Beside the figures and to make them stand out all the better, rich rugs of different colors, and between the first and the other corner, large ovals, in the center of which was depicted Pandora. Beside them, Mercury was particularly well painted. The vault stretched over the upper cornice, and the shadow below made a very good effect. The large stucco listels all around were completely gilded. The adjoining room must also have been painted by M. de La Fosse. Above, in the oval room, the mirrors made a very good impression. They were arranged circularly and were as tall as the five windows. There was only a woodwork of a half-high. In each panel were placed three ice sheets, about 6 qv. High and, when you were in the center of the panel, you could see each other in the three windows at once. The gallery was nicely decorated with a number of tables of jasper, busts, etc., and all the King's actions were to be painted by Van der Meulen; Two were already completed. At one end of the gallery there was a drawing-room, in which the table and the whole panel between the two windows were lined with mirror glass, and the opening of the doors was so great that, Far, one could almost see the whole gallery. There is, moreover, a profusion of beautiful, very large mirrors. The furniture was very fine, but not of a peculiar taste. All winters are removed because of soil moisture. Beneath, in M. de Louvois's own room, there were three pipes of copper which permitted heat to pass at will. This heat came from a copper stove placed in the chimney of the neighboring room. A ventilation pipe passing under the vestibule arrived at this chimney, and then distributed the heat, when the window of this chamber was opened (like the "heat-making machine" at Versailles).
  Borne to one of the sides of the stable by pillars of stones or buttresses, the house is externally in very bad condition. The site is rugged to the possible but nevertheless very pleasant. The central aisle below in the garden in front of the terraces, is covered with turf and 70 yards wide; Then, in the middle of an alley of sand of eight yards wide, are spruces and other trees; Then, on two sides, a new lawn of nine yards, and again a sandy alley with trees eight yards wide. The parterre of M. Le Nostre, in the middle, in front of the cave that I have drawn, is very nice, so the two "embroidery" in the center in front of the 
caption: Madame de Louvois in Meudon. Museum of Versailles. At the back is the parterre and the Grotto.
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