#tulieries palace

[hexthelore]

The Legend of The Tuileries Palace

photo is public domain

There once was a palace in Paris, that stood as a focal point of the city. It was a glory to behold, built in the 1500’s by Catherine de Medici. The building of it took place during war, though sometimes the construction halted because of war. The war was exaggerated by the efforts of Queen Catherine, seeping the beginnings of the palace in a metaphorical blood red. Throughout this palace’s history, it would be used as a royal residence on and off, up until the point that it was burned to the ground. War continued as a defining point of the Tuileries Palace, as it ultimately destroyed it. As a result of the siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian war, the regular French government gave up Paris in 1871, leaving the Paris Commune to take over the governance of Paris for two months. Of course, the French Army took down the Commune once it had regrouped, in what came to be known as “the Bloody Week.”

During this bloody week, on the evening of May 21, 1871, Jules Bergeret, the former chief military commander of the Paris Commune, burned the Tuileries Palace to the ground. Now, only the garden remains as a reminder of the palace that used to stand there centuries earlier. Well, maybe not just one reminder; Lore lingers in the garden as well, with the tales of L’homme Rouge, also known as “The Red Man, “Red Spectre,” demon, goblin, ghost… He is best described as devilish.

L’homme Rouge, usually depicted as a man in all red, began his appearances in the 16th century. It started with Catherine de Medici. In the main version of the lore, he was hired as her henchman to kill her enemies of war. Ultimately, he suffered for being her confidant of unpleasant secrets, and Queen Catherine had John l’écorcheur (John The Skinner), later to be the Red Man, killed in the Tuileries gardens. However, when the man who killed him on behalf of the Queen came back for John’s corpse a couple days later, he found it to be missing. The Queen’s astrologist claimed that John would haunt the Tuileries until it was destroyed, appearing for every tragedy up until that point. According to legend, he did just that.

photo from Bibliothèque nationale de France

Over the centuries, people have claimed to see the Red Man mostly at times of death for the royals -- aside from the time he gave Napoleon Bonapart military advice. He was seen the night of Henry IV’s assination in 1610. He was there for the death of Louis XVI in 1793. Marie Antoinette’s servants met the L’homme Rouge before the infamous Queen’s death. The last account of the Red Man to date was only a few days before the Tuileries Palace burned down, from a caretaker of the Louvre. There is a clear connection of the Red Man and the death at and of the Tuileries Palace.

The lore presents a correlation: the devil and politics. The royals of France have committed many horrors, and thus they are sinners- for a religious region, this means that the French royals of the Tuileries Palace may have been in cahoots with the devil. This is exemplified by the Red Man helping Napoleon Bonapart strategize in war, perhaps relaying an instance of a ‘deal with the devil.’ Importantly, this lore depicts a devilish character rather than a ghost that truly haunts the palace. Rather than haunting in the traditional sense, the Red Man forwarns the tragedies to come, resembling Death in this way. Starting with his own death, he saw over the deaths of many others, and ultimately the palace itself.

sources: Amy’s Crypt --  Daily Beast (Christopher Dickey) -- Geri Walton 

[napoleondidthat]

Tuileries Palace--Paris, France

[alexandriainneverland]

Autumn in Paris. November 2014. • • • #travel #adventure #travelvlog #vsco #travelblog #traveller #blog #blogger #vlog #vlogger #paris #france #tulieries #harlaxton #studyabroad (at Tuileries Palace)