Episode 9 Inside Versailles

Bonjour. Welcome to Inside Versailles where it's all happening.

We've seen Beatrice being beheaded - nasty.

-Louis de Rohan. Wrong 'un?

-Wrong 'un.

Yeah, I knew it. And we've also seen Henriette being taken ill.

Hopefully, not too serious.

And, also, there's a sort of curious thing for us Brits at home.

We've got William and Mary being coupled up.

Yes, that amazing scene when Charles II said, "Well, actually,

"William, you are my friend because you're going to marry my niece."

And it brings it home to us that William Of Orange,

the person so hated by Louis,

so feared by him, is actually our William and Mary, our William III.

-That's right, they're going to become our Kings in 1688.

-1688.

-Joint monarchs.

Which has never happened, after all, before.

But, really, we need to talk about etiquette.

We've seen an awful lot of etiquette in the episode and we are

joined by Dr Sara Barker.

Philippe is put in charge of etiquette. What does that even mean?

What's going on in this lovely portrait? Could you give us a hand?

Absolutely. Etiquette is really important at the French court.

It's all about power.

It's establishing who is in control,

who's got preference, who's in favour with the King.

So, there's all kinds of different things going on there.

So, when you go to this picture here of the "grand lever," which is what

we saw in the drama, the idea that when the king even gets out of bed

-that's got to be witnessed by the courtiers.

-Absolutely.

Every single minute of the day is scheduled, is timetabled and

Louis is really on show the entire time from when he gets up.

The day actually starts before Louis gets up.

His valet, who we've seen throughout the series, sleeps on

a bed in his chamber but gets up before him,

gets all the servants in to silently go around

getting the room perfect for when Louis will wake up.

And it carries on from there throughout the day.

It's quite funny, isn't it? Because we have this "grand lever" and the "petit lever."

So, the petit lever is the one that you really want to be at

cos it's very intimate, and then you come out

and you basically get dressed in front of the whole court.

A bit weird, getting dressed in front of the whole court.

Yeah, I think there are slightly different notions of privacy

than we would have today. Various aspects...

It's strange to imagine our Queen doing that in Buckingham Palace.

Absolutely. The King's body is not quite his own.

Every single aspect of his morning routine is witnessed.

It's hilarious to think that actually some kings were

so wearied by this great big ceremony that they got up,

did some stuff, went hunting then when back to bed to have the lever.

Yes, because that's the only chance you get to have some privacy,

really, during the day.

And, also, he's not even sleeping in the bed, particularly this special,

ceremonial bed. He gets into it from his other bed.

Well, he may well have been somewhere else during the night.

-Right.

-Well, of course.

-OK.

Yes, so, it is all highly-polished, highly-routine.

Everyone knows where the King is going to be at every single stage

of the day and work that to their advantage because, as you say,

it's all about proximity and access.

This is where business is done and you actually see

who's important and who's not.

But Louis XIV didn't invent the lever, did he?

No, he didn't, it's an amalgamation of traditions.

Some French traditions, some Italian, some Spanish.

What Louis really does, is perfect this system.

And it really works brilliantly well for him.

He is incredibly good at remembering names and faces.

He plays his part to perfection.

He's really vain. Likes everyone to look at him.

"Look at me getting dressed, how great!"

I think you'd have to be like that to really make the most of it.

And we know, of course, slightly alarming for our modern

sensibilities, but Louis happily goes to the toilet in the open.

He just drops his breeches and does it there and then.

There's a chamber pot in the middle of the room.

He had a special chair with a potty put into the chair,

almost like a high seat for kids and he would just go on that and

it wasn't until the 1680s

that he even roped himself off with a little curtain.

So, he openly did it in front of courtiers and if you were in

the middle of a conversation, you just carried on chatting.

Well, it was rather difficult for the women because they were never allowed to go to

the loo themselves and so, especially on campaign, they had to go with him

for a long time and they couldn't possibly ever go to the loo, so some

of them became rather desperate and bursting by the end of it.

That's true, there's a, sort of, famous story that he would never let

his ladies urinate if they were travelling in his carriage and

apparently he had a very large bladder, he could hold his wee for quite some time.

-So, they were really desperate.

-One poor woman had to rush into a church.

-Really?

-Yes.

-Crikey.

So, Sara, it's almost like an instrument of political control, isn't it?

Because the nobles have to be there and do these pretty menial jobs.

I mean, you can't imagine the Duke Of Cassel being thrilled to

have to stand there watching the King put his shirt on.

No, I imagine that's probably true for some of them.

It's probably quite a tedious process.

But it's also about recognising who has authority,

who has power and not just with Louis,

there's differentiation between the nobles as well.

The closer you are allowed to the King the more in favour, the more high-ranking that you are.

So, when you're here, you're really in.

And it even comes down to the grandeur of the chairs in which people are sitting.

Louis here will always be in the most grand,

ornate chair, and then chairs become increasingly less grand

depending on where you are in the hierarchy.

Might get a stool if you're really lucky.

The stool is actually very lucky because that means that you

are allowed to sit at the foot of the King. And have his confidence.

Fascinating stuff, thank you very much, Sara.

It's been a thrilling episode, we've got one more left to go next week.

We've seen all kinds of people get their comeuppance and fingers crossed for Henriette.

So, join us next week for the last episode of Inside Versailles.

-Bonsoir.

-Bonsoir.