Introduction
The Palace of Versailles, all of its gilding and majesty, still attracts thousands of tourists who flock to enter the inner sanctum of kings while imagining queens and princesses taking baths surrounded by intoxicating scents, a daily life made up of luxury and glamor , contrasting with a filthy reality , a malodorous Versailles. The courtesans relieve themselves in the corners of the stairs, a king holds court on his close stool, where everyone empties their chamber pot from the top of their windows. Prejudices? But why this bad reputation? Were the kings as dirty as the stinking castle? Where do fantasies and reality intersect between the clean and the dirty in the castle of the Sun King?
It seems that Louis XIV would have taken only one bath during his long life!!
It must be said that at this time there were no bathrooms, specific places dedicated to personal hygiene , nevertheless, the king could take river baths. He also had the possibility of taking chamber baths and in these cases a copper tub was brought . The king was bathed, but in a rather exceptional way. The king had visited in his youth what we would now call spas, where the high male aristocracy met. Louis XIV therefore took more than one bath in his life. And if the Sun King preferred ponds, it was mainly to cool off and not to wash.
Moreover, in the classical period, the term hygiene was not used. And even if for us, and according to our own standards , Versailles is a place of grime and dirt, nevertheless, Louis XIV was convinced that it was remarkably clean.
But why not wash with water and why this fear of water?
At that time it was considered that water was not an element of cleanliness, quite the contrary. It is now believed that water carries all the evils, real or imaginary, it is feared that the pores of the skin dilated by the hot vapors are more vulnerable to miasmas and participate in the floods of epidemics. It is obviously the great fear of the plague that gave rise to this irrational fear of water (before the plague epidemic water was not considered dangerous). The fear of the epidemic established in Versailles the reign of filth.
It is also believed that hot water will let the body’s humors out, thus causing the loss of vital forces, and even causing miscarriages.
Louis XIV had very frequent bloodlettings, for example, every 15 days. The bloodlettings were considered purifying for the body. During that time, it was believed that cleanliness resided in the interior of the body and could be achieved through methods like expulsion, such as purging. There was also an emphasis on maintaining a fresh and radiant complexion by resorting to various remedies, including enemas.
How to purify yourself Louis XIV
During Louis XIV’s reign, there was only one bathroom, or rather, a bathing apartment. Today, a remnant of this remarkable room is preserved in the orangery: an octagonal bathtub carved from a single block of marble. It was commissioned by the king for his favorite, the Marquise de Montespan, and was intended to adorn an apartment of unimaginable luxury.
This bathtub had several reasons for its size; it could easily accommodate both the king and his favorite for relaxation, comfort, and even moments of eroticism, but it was not primarily used for cleansing. Neither the king nor the courtiers at Versailles were particularly fond of bathtubs. Additionally, the courtiers’ apartments were often too small to accommodate such facilities.
But if we do not wash in a bath, how is the toilet carried out?
The expression that is used in particular at the court of Louis XIV is that of dry toilet, and it is a toilet without water, wiping with a white cloth that can be soaked in an acidic liquid. It is considered that this acidity is supposed to rid sweat or grime more effectively.
The toilet of King Louis XIV
For Louis XIV when he woke up, his first visitors to enter his the room were “the people of the faculty”, that is to say his first doctor who took his pulse and also his surgeon who checked his stools. After that was the toilet which was not only dry but also public. The courtesans will gradually enter according to their rank to attend the king’s toilet.
Louis XIV is installed, he is given his shirt and his first valet brings him spirits of wine (alcohol at 90°) to wash his hands, he is presented with a towel to wipe their hands, after the king is installed to be shaved, they rinse their face with a sponge of water containing spirits of wine. So really a bit of a basic makeover. And it was a real spectacle to see the king wash himself. At that time all the nobility practiced the dry toilet.
At court, little works circulated, so small that they could easily be slipped into the pocket, called “treaties of propriety and civility”. The treaty dictates the rules of etiquette to newcomers.
At Versailles cleanliness comes down to appearance, the supreme distinction goes first through the linen, it must be white, immaculate. Admittedly, we don’t wash, but we change shirts up to several times a day, because the renewal of shirts erases, we think, the dirt. Cleanliness is something that shows itself. So one must own a lot of shirts.
The linen represents a luxury item, excessively expensive, because it is made of cotton, linen, or precious fabrics.
In the wardrobes of courtesans, the shirts number in the dozens and are so precious to the owners that they are mentioned in the inventories after death.
Being proper to the castle therefore comes down to taking care of the parts of the body that are subject to the gaze, the private parts, they are not necessarily the subject of care, at least not in the great century.
How then to hide the bad smell
Civility treatises tell courtiers the right way to blow their nose, give recipes to arm themselves against fetid breath or smelly feet. But it is not possible to completely eliminate bodily odors. Apothecaries are responsible for making scent sachets for clothes, linens, and wigs.
Small perfumed bundles are placed under the armpits or on the hips, slipped into the folds of dresses or the lapels of doublets. Perfume then becomes the king of artifices. Perfume happens precisely to compensate for this lack of cleanliness by masking the odors. It is made from animal scents: civet, musk, and amber.
During his youth, Louis XIV obviously abused these perfumes; subsequently, he will no longer support it, to the point of asking his courtesans not to use them anymore. And he used a perfume made from orange blossom. In times of plague or epidemic, perfume is used as a purifying agent.
Perfume became a sign of social status, to such an extent that distinctions were made: a royal perfume, a bourgeois perfume, and a perfume for the poor.
At the castle, perfume obviously participates in luxury life. For its sumptuous parties, Louis XIV embellishes its fountains with essences of orange blossoms and jasmine. But it was under Louis XV that the court of Versailles was called the perfumed court because, to be at the forefront of fashion, the scent changed every day. The famous perfume with a thousand flowers will be created for Marie-Antoinette, an olfactory masterpiece composed with the flowers of all seasons.
Make-up and cleaning
The other illusion of cleanliness is makeup. To apply makeup is to deceive, to camouflage pockmarked faces. We then apply makeup to her face, deceiving her true feelings. The courtesan must control everything, both her natural expressions and her emotions.
In the great century, there is a new hierarchy of the senses. What matters are appearances, what we see, not the truth. Cosmetics and makeup participate in this art of deception. The faces are almost cartoonish, with white and red accents, emphasizing all expressions. The demand for whiteness tyrannizes over complexion. Similar to linen, the face must appear immaculate. White evokes an ideal of virginity. It is the symbol of an idle class, aristocrats sheltered from the sun and bad weather, unlike the brown faces of the common people.
This pursuit of whiteness leads to all sorts of remedies, even the most toxic. The most widely used bleaching agent at the time was the famous White Ceruse, which caused significant damage to the skin. It caused irritation and extreme dryness. White lead, which is lead carbonate, is a metallic powder that can cause even greater harm, such as to eyesight.
As white lead can permanently alter the skin, other strategies are employed. The use of beauty patches, which are meant to be the final touch of makeup, also attempts to conceal the effects of this harmful product. It was common to see more than 18 beauty patches on the face, hiding various blemishes.
To maintain cleanliness and neatness, women equip their dressing tables with the necessary tools for makeup: ointment boxes, beauty patch boxes, ointments, and perfumes. They even carry small kits in the folds of their dresses, each more delicate and ornate than the other.
Another color that signifies the pinnacle of this illusion is red. It is believed to enhance the whiteness of the complexion and disguise signs of aging. One can imagine the faces at court: fiery-colored cheeks, heavily plastered faces with veins highlighted in blue, and hair like white wool.
This obsession with whiteness permeates every aspect. Not a single hair is adorned without being powdered, as washing the hair is not the practice, but powdering it is.
The mouth
The major concern at the castle is bad breath, and the courtesans strive to control it, but with little success. The majority of them had dreadful mouths. However, various methods were employed. Teeth were brushed with tobacco and even with urine, as it was believed to have whitening properties. The ladies would place a small ball to conceal the sunken area caused by a missing tooth.
Louis XIV had a dental practitioner who provided him with wooden roots every morning for rubbing his teeth, such as licorice, rosemary, and rose. Since a young age, he had dental issues and frequent abscesses, resulting in a foul-smelling mouth. By the age of 50, he had lost all his teeth.
Go to the bathroom
In the 17th century, Louis XIV still used a close stool, and it was considered an honorable practice rather than indecent. He had special chair booths constructed in his closet or nearby areas. In the 18th century, Marie-Antoinette also used a close stool, as paper was not yet in use, and cotton and linen were used instead. The waste from these stools was poured into cesspools. Unfortunately, some of Louis XIV’s servants preferred to empty the pots out the window. To accommodate the 4,000 residents and visitors at the castle, public latrines called “pissing walls” were built. However, these facilities were not sufficient, and people started relieving themselves in the castle corridors. Consequently, Versailles had a pervasive smell of urine. Women would discreetly carry small pots under their dresses to relieve themselves, often concealed in books with titles like “Travel to the Netherlands,” as France was at war with Holland at that time, and it was seen as a comical act of defecating on the Netherlands.
Despite having a large number of servants responsible for cleaning the castle, it was still infested with rats. The problem of overflowing cesspools added to the unsanitary conditions, as they were not regularly emptied.
After the death of King Louis XIV, illegal connections to the cesspools led to water contamination and the spread of epidemics. When Louis XV returned to Versailles, the water’s sanitary condition was catastrophic. Steps were taken to improve the city’s sanitation, and hygiene made progress during Louis XV’s reign. Water began to be used for personal hygiene, and he had seven bathrooms built, including two bathtubs—one for washing and the other for rinsing.
