Notre-Dame de Paris by Captivating History

Author:Captivating History
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Notre-Dame de Paris, Catholic cathedral 4th arrondissement of Paris, Virgin Mary French Gothic Gallo-Roman rib vault, Christianity in France naturalism cathedra mosaics, French Revolution Goddess of Liberty Renaissance, coronation of Napoleon I liberation of Paris, Archdiocese of Paris Crown of Thorns Louis XIII
Publisher: Captivating History
Published: 2020-06-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7 – The Emperor and the Hunchback

Illustration VII: Notre-Dame's inspiring architecture served as Victor Hugo's muse when he was writing his most famous work, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Golden morning light streamed into the heart of Notre-Dame, filtered by its tall windows. The light sparkled upon the gilded wrought-iron fence and slid across the surfaces of restored artworks that decorated its interior. Outside, the beheaded statues of the Kings of Judah had been returned to their rightful places. Crosses and cherubim, virgins and kings once again adorned the mighty church.

Ever since the revolutionaries first destroyed her majesty in 1793, Notre-Dame had found itself housing various cults and even being used for completely non-spiritual purposes. The Cult of Reason had been supplanted by the Cult of the Supreme Being in mid-1794, and a mixture of philosophy and pagan rituals continued to be celebrated inside the venerated walls for years. That was until Napoleon Bonaparte rose to power. A military genius who had been serving France during the Revolution, Napoleon's vision of post-Revolution France did not align with that of the radical Jacobins that were then in control of the government. He staged a coup in 1799, overthrew the French Directory, and established a Consulate, naming himself as the First Consul.

By that point, Napoleon was the most powerful man in France. But First Consul was not enough for him. He wanted a higher title with more power that was preferably a hereditary one. Being king would take a step back into the days before the Revolution, so Napoleon aimed even higher. He decided to have himself crowned emperor.

And so, on December 2nd, 1804, Notre-Dame was packed with people. Years of restoration work had gone into turning it from the hole of pagan worship it had been during the Revolution back to its former glorious self. Napoleon had chosen it as the perfect venue for his coronation: beautiful, majestic, and at the center of France's capital, but not bearing the same negative connotations as Reims, the historic location for the coronations of the very kings that the revolutionaries had just overthrown.

Napoleon had also decided to restore Christianity to a legal and acceptable religion in France. The revolutionaries had been unsuccessful in eradicating it. Only the most radical of the French people agreed to join their cults; most still clung to their beliefs despite persecution from the revolutionaries. While the church and state were now separate once and for all, Napoleon himself remained a Roman Catholic and saw his coronation as a statement about his divine appointment to the rank of emperor.

The coronation ceremony was in full swing. Music rose up, sweet hymns once again filling the air inside the belly of Notre-Dame. Its bells rang once more, their clear and poignant peals echoing across a restored Paris. Pope Pius VII anointed Napoleon's head and hands, a sacred ceremony that he would have performed on a new king if the monarchy had not been destroyed. But one thing was different about this ceremony, a stark reminder that the old glory days of Catholicism were gone.

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