Louvre – A Traveling Fool

June 27, 2025

April in Paris: Adventures at the Louvre

After we had breakfast together and my friends headed out to catch their trains home, I walked south to the Rue de Rivoli and then east to the Place du Carrousel entrance to the Louvre. Back when I first learned about that entrance, it was a hidden, secret entrance. We had entered through an unmarked door, ventured down a dingy corridor, to some very industrial-looking stairs that weren’t all that well lit. Now it is all well-marked, well-lit, and welcoming. It looks much more like the entrance to a shopping mall than an entrance to a museum.

In the past, whoever I was with and I would be the only people navigating those stairs. This time, there were escalators as well as a wide set of stairs. There were several others going in the way I was and I just fell in with them.

Back in the day, anyone coming in from the Carrousel entrance would just merge at the ticket desk with those coming in from the Pyramid entrance. Now tickets must be purchased in advance. There are also multiple (three or four at various times) entrances which all merge downstairs to get into the museum.

I just continued to follow the others who had come in at the same time as I did as we wound around a few times to get to where everyone merged. Then, after what seemed like a longer walk than what it had taken to get to the museum, we finally got into the entrance line itself. I was quietly waiting for the line to inch along and was taking in all of the changes when a guy came up from behind me and accused me of butting into the line ahead of him.

I explained that I had just come in with all of these other people who were ahead of me and this was where we ended up. He then said that he had come in from the subway, “like everybody else”, but had never seen me until now. When I tried to tell him that there were multiple entrances which all merge there, he said that I was a lying bitch. So, since I choose which fights are worth fighting and which aren’t, I said, “If it means that much to you to go in two seconds ahead of me, go head.” Then I stepped back to let him and the woman who was with him move ahead of me. Unfortunately that didn’t satisfy him.

He just kept after me letting me know what a horrible, entitled person he thought I was. So I motioned for a security person to come over to us. Then I asked him to explain to her what his complaint was. Her response was to explain to him about the multiple entrances all converging where we were and asked me which entrance I had used. I told her and she said to him, “She came in from a different entrance and that was why you didn’t see her until you got here where everyone merges.”

He still wasn’t going to let it go. She pointed out that he was in front of me, so she didn’t understand the problem. He wanted me to be kicked out of the museum. She said to me, “Come with me”. He was a happy man now. He thought she was going to do what he told her to do. She didn’t. Instead she took me in through the security entrance. I thought that was very kind of her and thanked her. She wanted to get me away from him. She also told me that, if he found me and harassed me at any point while I was in the museum, let a security person know immediately and he would be the one tossed out.

As packed as the place was, I had already decided to start with some areas other than where the big crowds would likely be going first and then say “Hi” to Mona later. I headed for the excavations under the Cour Carrée, which is surrounded by the Sully Wing. This is where the base of the towers and the drawbridge supports of the fortress of King Philippe-Auguste can be seen.

This is the oldest part of the Louvre, which began construction in roughly 1190. The oldest portion of the palace still above ground, which dates from the late 1540s, is known as the Lescot Wing. It is the part of the Sully Wing that is on the western side of the Cour Carrée. It was built by King Francis I.

When I went up to the Ground Floor I was inside that part of the palace. The official Louvre website has an interactive map of the museum. One can click on a room and see what it contains. Also, if you want to visit a particular piece of art, you can enter its name and it will tell you the wing, floor and room number. Very handy for advance planning. I had my basic route figured out in advance, subject to any changes due to crowds or fatigue.

I crossed into the Denon Wing to visit the Dying Slave and Rebellious Slave sculptures by Michelangelo and Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss in Room 403. Then I returned to the Sully Wing to check on Venus de Milo before moving on to the Egyptian Antiquities in the eastern part of that wing. When I had last been there, I had not yet been to Egypt. So I was even more interested in them now, especially both Horus (I had visited a couple of his temples) and the Seated Scribe. The Seated Scribe was up one floor from where I was, but there was plenty to explore on the Ground Floor before moving up to the 1^st Floor. There were several more rooms full of Egyptian artifacts on that floor too.

Returning to the Denon Wing, I viewed the Winged Victory of Samothrace before moving on to the paintings. This was where the museum really became crowded.

I had some favorite paintings in both rooms 702 and 700 which I visited before venturing into Room 711, which was where Leonardo da Vinci’s ultra-famous Mona Lisa was located. Patience is definitely needed to be able to catch a quick glimpse of her. She is by far the most popular attraction in the entire Louvre.

In Room 702, the Death of Marat has always interested me because I was once in a production of the play “Marat Sade”, which was based upon the death of Jean-Paul Marat. The character I played had originally been a priest in a straight jacket representing the real life priest Jacques Roux. We changed the character to a nun. The habit I wore was real as was the straight jacket. I needed to trust that they would actually let me out of it.

The painting of the Coronation of Napoleon in the same room depicts Napoleon crowning Josephine by the altar of the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris. In the upper right can be seen the Pieta just behind the altar. She same Pieta my friends and I sat in front of during our visit to Notre Dame earlier in the week.

I had debated skipping seeing the Mona Lisa this time as enormously large crowds are not at all something that I enjoy. But it would have been like not saying “hi” to an old friend (we first made our acquaintance in 1984). So I took a deep breath and waded into the fray. Yes, she is worth seeing – whether for the first time or the seventh.

Emerging unscathed from that room I ventured over to the Richelieu Wing to visit the apartments of Napoleon III. These aren’t merely decorated rooms that have been set up in the Louvre. These are the actual rooms created during the time of Napoleon III in the Second Empire (1852-1870) as state rooms for the use of the Minister of State (whose family occupied private rooms nearby) to hold receptions, dinners, masked balls, etcetera. They have survived miraculously mostly intact for over 150 years and have been open to the public since 1993. I had only seen them once before in 2000, so wanted to take a better look at these rooms this visit. They are quite sumptuous.

The photo that I have of the Salon Theatre is quite interesting for a couple of reasons. The room can be converted from a salon to a theatre relatively easily. The piece of furniture that can be seen in the center front of the photo is a chair made for three people to sit together closely for a private conversation.

From there, I took the stairs down to the Cour Marly, which was created in 1993 when this portion of the Louvre Palace was integrated into the museum. It had been an open courtyard which was then covered with a glass ceiling and the entire space temperature-controlled. Then it was filled with monumental sculptures from the gardens, fountains and groves of a leisure residence of King Louis XIV at Marly, near Versailles. These had been scattered all over Paris after the destruction of the royal residence. Since 1993 they have been housed together in this glorious space. The beautiful Marly Horses are displayed at the top level of the courtyard.

Next time –The Marvelous Musée des Arts Décoratifs

September 14, 2022

Grand France River Cruise – Paris Louvre & Île de la Cité

Paris is one of my very favorite cities. I think it is for a lot of people. The history, the culture, the food, the art – so much to do and see. Or, just hang out at one of the sidewalk cafes and let Paris parade by.

I am separating a post on just Notre Dame Cathedral from this one on the rest of my visit to Paris partially because of all of the photos I took of the cathedral. That post follows this one.

The included morning excursion on our full day in the city was a choice between a coach trip of the entire city of Paris, or a walking tour of part of Paris. Since I had been to Paris a few times before, I chose the walking tour. It was to take place mainly on the Île de la Cité, which was the location of the origins of Paris.

A Celtic tribe called the Parissii inhabited what eventually became the Île de la Cité starting in the middle of the 3^rd century BC. In 52 BC, the Romans settled on Paris’ Left Bank and called their settlement Lutetia. Eventually Lutetia joined with the Île de la Cité becoming Parisius and then Paris.

During the 12^th century AD, the royal residence was located at the western end of the Île de la Cité and Notre Dame Cathedral was being constructed at its eastern end. As the marshland on the Right Bank began to fill in, the city expanded in that direction. At this time the medieval Louvre fortress was extended to defend the city on the far west of the Right Bank.

Our ship was docked by the Eiffel Tower, so we were piled onto a motorcoach and driven to the Louvre, from where we would begin our tour. On the way to the Louvre, we could see the Musee d’Orsay on the other side of the Seine.

Remnants of the original medieval building of the Louvre can still be seen in the crypt of the current building. We would not be going inside though. It can take an entire day just to explore the Louvre. My mom and I had done so on a couple of previous trips.

In the 14^th century, the Louvre was converted from a fortress to a royal residence and began to be rebuilt in the 16^th century in the French Renaissance style. But in the 17^th century, the court was moved to Versailles and building at the Louvre was stopped.

The Louvre had started to house works of art during the 16^th and 17^th centuries. By the middle of the 18^th century, a public gallery began to be planned. By 1776, the Grande Galerie of the Louvre was being converted, but remained incomplete until the French Revolution.

We entered the Cour Carree through the portion of the Louvre known as the Sully Wing. This is the oldest part of the building. When I had been in the museum in 2000, there was a wonderful Rembrandt exhibit up on the 1^st floor. The Venus de Milo usually hangs out on the ground floor.

We then passed through the Pavillon de l’Horloge into the Cour Napoleon where we could see the glass Pyramid that was used as the main entrance. In the Cour Napoleon (named after Napoleon III who greatly enlarged the museum), we not only checked out the Pei Pyramid, but also the Carrousel de Louvre and an equestrienne statue of Louis XIV.

The Carrousel was a much smaller version of the Arc de Triomphe and once had the horses from Saint Mark’s Basilica in Venice at the top. Napoleon Bonaparte stole them from there. But they had been stolen from the Hippodrome in Istanbul (then Constantinople) many centuries earlier.

In addition to the Sully Wing, the other two main wings are the Denon Wing (home of both the Winged Victory and the Mona Lisa) and the Richellieu Wing (chock full of loads of cool stuff, including the rooms used by Napoleon III).

When leaving out through the Cour Carree again, we encountered a heavily-scaffolded Church of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois. It also had the sun behind it. So a decent photo wasn’t possible. It had been originally built in the 5th century to commemorate a meeting of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois with Saint Genevieve (the future patron saint of Paris) on the spot where it is said the meeting took place. Over the centuries it has been enlarged and rebuilt several times. Since the fire at Notre Dame Cathedral, it temporarily held the services that had been conducted at Notre Dame.

We headed over to the Île de la Cité where we would have visited the Conciergerie and Sainte-Chapelle Cathedral. But there was a very big trial going on which meant that both of those buildings and much of the island were off limits. The trial of 20 men accused in the coordinated attacks on Paris (on a stadium, bars, restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall) in 2015 was underway. The lone surviving actual attacker from that night, Salah Abdeslam, was the key defendant. He was also the only one charged with murder.

The Palais de Justice de Paris includes both the Conciergerie and Sainte-Chapelle in addition to the Prefecture de Police. A special courtroom had been constructed somewhere within the vast expanse of court buildings covering the west end of the island. What was needed was very high security (bomb-proof and bullet-proof) as well as an attempt to create a calming atmosphere.

Normally we would have been able to cross over the Pont Neuf to reach the Île de la Cité, but we weren’t allowed to cross there. We went down some stairs to the Quai de la Megisserie, which didn’t allow any motorized vehicles so we could walk along in relative peace and quiet while looking across the river at the island. Normally there would have been sightseeing boats along the river, but we didn’t see any other than those docked by the Pont Neuf.

In the included photo of the Île de la Cité with the Pont Neuf, can be seen an equestrian statue of Henry IV. He was the king who inaugurated the Pont Neuf in 1607.

At the Pont au Change, we went back up some stairs to see if we could cross there. We couldn’t, so we just stayed up on the street level until we got to the Pont Notre-Dame. I was so glad that it wasn’t my first (or only) time in Paris. The Conciergerie and Sainte-Chapelle are both very much worth a visit. I had been looking forward to spending some time in both.

The Conciergerie was originally part of the former royal palace. During the French Revolution, 2,780 prisoners, including Marie Antoinette, were imprisoned, tried and sentenced there. Most were executed elsewhere by use of the guillotines which were set up all across Paris. But there were still hundreds who died in what is known as the Women’s Courtyard when they were simply shot to death there.

Parts of the 10^th century building constructed under Hugh Capet still survive. The cell where Marie Antoinette was imprisoned can be visited, as well as a later chapel built in her honor. Many other historic areas of the very large building were also normally open to the public.

The original version of Sainte-Chapelle was built in 800. In 1238, Louis IX had it redesigned and enlarged. The two levels of the new chapel, equal in size, had entirely different purposes. The upper level, where the sacred relics were kept was reserved exclusively for the royal family and their guests. The lower level was used by the courtiers, servants, and soldiers of the palace.

Sainte-Chapelle is breathtaking. It appears to be all stain-glassed windows with no real structure other than the windows. It glitters and shines like thousands of jewels.

Everywhere on the Île de la Cité we could see barricades and lots and lots of police. They were watching everyone. Not wanting to attract any attention, we kept quiet and kept moving across the island towards Notre Dame. I did manage to take a quick photo of the spire of Sainte-Chapelle as we passed from a couple of blocks away.

After a fairly long time sitting in front of Notre Dame while listening to our local guide talk about its history, we crossed the Petit-Pont and had some free time on the Left Bank. I took tons of photos of Notre Dame, then a short break at the café on the corner of the road there. After that, I explored the Square Rene Viviani and the adjacent Church of Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, which was built at the same time as Notre Dame.

When we regathered by the entrance of the square to continue our tour, we heard a lot of sirens heading our way. It turned out to be the main terrorist going right by us on his way to his trial.

Moving further into the Latin Quarter, we could see the remains of a Roman bath house upon which was built part of the Musee de Cluny (aka Musee National du Moyen Age Paris). This museum is loaded with tapestries statues and other artifacts from the Middle Ages in Paris. They also have quite a few pieces of Roman antiquity in addition to the bath house.

Once we hopped back onto the coach to head back to the ship, we drove by the Sorbonne, Pantheon, the Luxembourg Gardens, a cute little church called Notre Dame des Champs, the Hotel des Invalides (containing Napoleon’s tomb) and the Eiffel Tower again.

Next time – Notre Dame de Paris Cathedral (with loads of photos of the building in scaffolding)