The Palace of
Fontainebleau, located 55 kilometres from the centre of Paris, is one of
the largest French royal chateaux. The palace as it is today is the work of
many French monarchs, building on an early 16th-century structure of Francis I.
The building is arranged around a series of courtyards. The commune of Fontainebleau
has grown up around the remainder of the Forest of Fontainebleau, a former
royal hunting park. This forest is now home to many endangered species of
Europe. The older chateau on this site was already used in the latter part of
the 12th century by King Louis VII, for whom Thomas Becket consecrated the
chapel. Fontainebleau was a favourite residence of Philip Augustus (Philip II)
and Louis IX. The creator of the present edifice was Francis I, under whom the
architect Gilles le Breton erected most of the buildings of the Cour Ovale, including the Porte Doree, its southern entrance.
The king also invited the architect Sebastiano Serlio to France, and Leonardo
da Vinci. The Gallery of Francis I, with its frescoes framed in stucco by Rosso
Fiorentino, carried out between 1522 and 1540, was the first great decorated
gallery built in France. Source
0 comments:
Post a Comment