Saturday, November 04, 2006

Place Dauphine


If you click on the photo you can see a surprise painted on the roof of the apartment building.

Place Dauphine is a small "square" (more like a triangle) almost at the western tip of the Ile de la Cité, the island on which the Notre Dame cathedral sits, at the opposite end. It is lined with 17th c. houses. There is a wonderful tavern called Henry IV at the opening. Henry IV had this place built and named for the "dauphin" - - Louis XIII. Have you seen "Marie Antoinette" yet?


Place Dauphine by Michel Delacroix

6 comments:

rauf said...

Marie Antoinette was completely out of place in Paris

Its a lovely building, saw the painting too, but it doesn't look too old, perhaps very well maintained. How did it survive 2nd world war ?

Ruth said...

Rauf, the new movie about her shows the start of her move to France, when she had to literally shed Austria in a tent on the way to Versailles.

There is a great book titled "Is Paris Burning?", and account of the period just before the Liberation of Paris in WWII when a German general was commanded to blow up the bridges and important monuments by the Fuhrer, but he placed the bombs and could not give the command to blow them up. The French Resistance, DeGaulle and the Americans liberated the city, and it seemed he was relieved. It would have been such a shame to destroy so much beauty. Maybe I should do a post on that book and incident. I am fascinated by that period in Paris. The book is a quick easy novel-like read if you can find it in a library in Chennai.

Ginnie Hart said...

Did we see this Place with you, Ruth? Hmmm. It's not sticking in my mind, if so.

Ruth said...

Ginnie, no, in May was my first visit to Place Dauphine.

sandy said...

I couldn't quite see what you were talking about on the roof, I could see something was painted.

Ruth said...

Sandy, it's a kitty! Hard to see. :)