At Versailles, said Saint-Simon, Louis XIV “ took pleasure in tyrannizing nature, taming it with art and treasures “. A perfect illustration of environmental absolutism, enslaving environments to the will of the Sovereign, the ecology of Versailles has a lot to teach us.
Versailles fascinates historians and the general public alike. An expression of French absolutism, the castle is once again a place of exhibition and legitimization of artistic creation. At the end of the XVIIe century, Louis XIVhaving become sedentary, wanted to make his residence a powerful communication tool on a European scale. Guiding his guests into his garden and commanding the water jets with a whistle, the king wanted to send a clear message: the landscape, as an artifact, must express power over the elements and over the men now placed under the orders of the sovereign.
However, this process of civilization goes far beyond the human framework. ; it initiates a radical environmental transformation and in return provokes multiple and unforeseen responses from natural environments. This is the thesis developed, in a brief and incisive work, by the historian Grégory Quenet, who highlights the other, much more negative face of the Versailles glitz. By questioning the environmental cost of political effectiveness and nature’s responses to developments, Versailles, a natural history offers a definition of environmental absolutism as it has developed over a long XVIIIe century.
A domesticated nature
No historian would dream of contesting the planning force which was exerted on the Versailles space. The natural environment was completely disrupted in order to create a landscape worthy of the kings who resided there. In addition to memoirs and printed works, the history of Versailles and its domain is traditionally written thanks to the archives of the King’s household and a few scraps kept in the Departmental Archives of Yvelines. Grégory Quenet is no exception to the rule. But he takes a singularly new look at this abundant documentation. Through the control of water and the challenges of hunting, he focuses on the unthought of the royal domain and gives a renewed vision of it.
The major hydraulic works carried out, such as the draining of the original marsh, necessary to create a grandiose perspective, or the arrangement of the network of fountains, are well known. Also, the natural history of Versailles focuses more on the tens of kilometers of drainage channels dug through the woods to capture runoff water and make it converge towards the reservoirs where they were stored while waiting to be released. ‘be pumped to be put on a show. Technically insignificant, invisible to the uninformed, these ditches nonetheless changed the lives of local farmers and required intense discussions because of the drain on water resources that they caused. The optimization of the operation of the network was ensured by a real police force of the flows responsible for its surveillance. The forest has for its part been entirely subjugated to the needs of hunting and the maintenance of a herd of deer essential to the satisfaction of this royal pleasure. The Bourbons enjoyed hunting to excess. The forests were therefore transformed into a giant breeding ground: game had to be abundant so that the king never lacked it. To do this, all the animals in the forest were monitored. Demanding for the environment, the pleasures and the honor of the king are also demanding for men. From the construction of the estate, the activities of the communities included therein were controlled and limited. From this angle, the management of the Versailles estate fully appears as a work of absolutist character, subjugating environments and men.
“ The natural always comes out and knows how to show itself »
Environmental history, however, consists of renewing the analysis by appropriating issues arising from ecology and the study of natural environments. G. Quenet does not proceed otherwise. He constructs his reflection by mobilizing the observations of naturalists on the subject of upheavals in the trophic, or food, chain in the large American parks following the eradication of wolves. Likewise, he summons the natural sciences of XVIIIe century, not in a history of science approach, but rather to show their link with the problems of the Versailles field and highlight their practical dimension. In the second half of XVIIIe century, monitoring game required counting it and examining its behavior to optimize its renewal. The daily management of the estate has thus contributed to the formation of original knowledge about animals. Responsible for the hunting administration of the estate and its farms from 1753 to 1789, friend of Diderot, d’Alembert and Helvétius, Charles-Georges Le Roy initiated pioneering work on animal behavior. Collaborator of The Encyclopediahe is the author of Animal intelligencepartly built around his experience as an administrator.
The originality of Quenet’s work thus lies in the change of perspective he brings about. While it would be easy to glorify the king’s power or to be offended by it, he questions a silent actor who never remains silent: nature. And this one screams, so to speak. The destruction of allied wolves and the decline in the number of hunts under Louis XV cause a proliferation of species intended to be hunted, including deer. Rabbits, stowaways from pheasantries, attack the forest so much so that, under Louis XVIthe area seems out of control. By focusing on the entire park of Versailles, Grégory Quenet’s book also reflects the fatigue of the men who live there. Many plots were left fallow so as not to harm the game and the peasants’ resources were reduced. Over time, the life of the communities established within the domain of Versailles became impossible without the support or clemency of royal agents. The amounts of the farms were lowered so as not to frighten off potential buyers. The theft of wood was tolerated there more than anywhere else and assistance from the king was regularly necessary for peasants unable to meet their needs. The decentring of environmental history thus underlines a surprising paradox: tolerance towards the most symbolic offenses of the Ancien Régime reigned at the heart of the temple of absolutism.
The contrast with the harmony and power displayed on the facade of the palace strikes the reader. The notebooks of grievances written on the eve of the Revolution bear witness to this: on the court side, the exhaustion of the circles imposes its rule and strains social relations. Versailles was conceived as an above-ground territory for sovereigns who never completely renounced the pleasures of nomadism. And it is in this sense that it was placed as heritage during the XIXe century. Initially a memorial to the late monarchy, considered the expression of its domination over men and nature, Versailles ultimately established itself as a monumental work of art, beyond all nature.
Versailles and environmental absolutism
By tackling the question of the relationship between power and the environment, G. Quenet offers throughout his work a definition of environmental absolutism. The affirmation of each power implies processes of transformation of environments ; for the Bourbons, control of water and forests was crucial. If Versailles embodies the power of the French monarchy, it is an aggressive power towards the environment and nature, the source of an impoverished environment. From this angle, an obvious critical remark can come to mind: the Versailles domain only represents, after all, a tiny part of French territory. Unique in every way, the castle and its park can rightly be considered as necessary victims in the conception of an image of power. The Versailles archival wealth, for its part, bears no comparison. Finally, the regulation of the use of natural resources was not carried out in such an authoritarian manner everywhere and the monarchy continued to encourage and facilitate cooperative modes of governance. Everywhere in the archives we see royal agents negotiating and discussing. In coastal marshes in particular, the Intendants encourage consultation between owners and the different stakeholders rather than imposing solutions.
However, G. Quenet’s conclusions deserve to be broadened. Beyond Versailles, he indeed approaches the process of territorialization of power in a new light. Throughout the modern period, central power dynamics have profoundly transformed nature. The canalization works have massively modified the profiles of the watersheds and the watercourses have continued to be rectified and cleaned in order to facilitate navigation or milling. From Bordeaux to Dunkirk, the coastlines have been developed and equipped to be better controlled and exploited. The need for marine or fuel wood has determined the evolution of the French forest cover. In reality, the needs of the king (of the State or the Monarchy, it depends) played a determining role in the construction of the French environment through the enslavement of environments. And if the history of these transformations is well known in its dimension “ developer », it is much less so under the environmental prism proposed by Grégory Quenet.