Paris episode 2 - Blood and Chocolate
Paris episode 2 - Blood and Chocolate
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00:00This is Paris.
00:10City of romance and adventure.
00:14From the buzz of its cafes to its swinging street life.
00:22Right from the very start, it's been a city of extremes.
00:29Love and hate, cathedrals and brothels, mean streets and gilded palaces.
00:41At the heart of it all, the unique spirit of Paris.
00:46Always inventive, always at the forefront of change.
00:52From high fashion and sexual freedom to the radical ideas that transform the way we all
00:57live.
00:58It's a city where the spirit of revolution never dies.
01:12Welcome to my city.
01:37Today is the Vendange, a celebration of the ancient tradition of wine growing in Paris,
01:42which dates back to the Roman times.
01:45Though it's a day of fun and frivolity, for Parisians, wine is always a serious business.
01:56No one connects wine growing with Paris anymore, but 2,000 years ago, that's what it was best
02:01known for.
02:07This small vineyard is one of the very few that remain.
02:13The grape harvest every October is still a crowd puller.
02:16We love to party in Paris.
02:26The festival is all rather eccentric and quaint.
02:30Even in Paris, people can't be cool all the time.
02:35A lot of us wouldn't dream of dressing up like this, but we are all proud of our history.
02:43In Paris, history means change.
02:46The city is dynamic and always has been.
02:49We've always thrived on new ideas, new ways of living and loving.
02:54No wonder Paris is known as the city of light and the home of revolution.
03:05Much of our history is there for all to see.
03:10But to really understand what makes Parisians tick, you need to dig a little deeper.
03:27In Paris, everything begins and ends with the river Seine, which flows right through
03:49the center of the city.
03:53The Celtic Parisi tribe, which gave Paris its name, settled here more than 2,000 years
03:58ago and the Romans followed.
04:03Nobody knows the Seine better than the Brigade Fluviale or River Police.
04:08Major Alain Roux patrols the waters, saving lives and solving crimes.
04:13Actually, if you can see with the scaffolding, that's the oldest house in Paris.
04:37That's great.
04:38I just love water, too.
04:39It's a different way to see Paris, I love it.
04:51This is the Notre-Dame Bridge, that was the very last inhabited bridge, with a windmill
04:57at the corner.
05:25Now a museum, of course.
05:27For centuries, the Louvre was the center of political power, but the river shaped Paris
05:32in other ways, too.
05:33There is a saying which says that the right bank spends and the left bank thinks.
05:44The right bank is the trading side, while the left bank is the intellectual side.
05:49And in the middle, the Ile de la Cité, where it all began.
06:07There's something you need to know to understand Paris, the way it looks and the way it feels.
06:12Over the centuries, Paris always lacked space, trying to push the city walls outside and
06:19building on top of the other buildings, always changing.
06:22It's what I like as a curator, to seek out the past and trying to understand the old
06:26Paris.
06:34The place to start is the Ile de la Cité.
06:38From medieval times until the 19th century, it was packed with disease-ridden slums.
06:45But now, all those narrow old streets have made way for a huge square in front of the
06:54magnificent Cathedral of Notre-Dame.
07:04This is officially the center of France, kilomètre zéro.
07:08Circumstances around the country are measured from this point.
07:11There could be no better place because Notre-Dame is the spiritual and mythical heart of France.
07:20Work on Notre-Dame began in the 12th century and it took 170 years to complete it.
07:26By far the tallest building Paris had ever seen.
07:31Today, it's one of the great cathedrals, a gothic masterpiece and a wonder of the world.
07:39Notre-Dame established Paris as one of the holiest cities in Europe, a center of culture
07:44and creativity.
07:45But it had another side to it, one of debauchery, violence and mystery.
07:55For centuries, the cathedral played host to the Fête des Fous or Festival of Fools,
08:01an astonishing spectacle of lust, violence and drunkenness within the sacred walls of
08:06Notre-Dame.
08:12This weird and wonderful place has inspired some great literary creations, including Victor
08:18Hugo's Hunchback.
08:22It's quite magical climbing up the towers of Notre-Dame, that reminds me of coming here
08:28as a kid.
08:29I was maybe nine.
08:30I was a bit scared because I wasn't sure about what I would find at the top, maybe the Hunchback.
08:48Yeah, here's the prize, the frightening gargoyles.
08:51The guardians of Paris.
08:52They're surveying the city, sprawling off into the distance.
09:00The grotesque faces are supposed to ward off evil spirits and look after the cathedral.
09:09Now I'm going to take you to a place that visitors never get to go.
09:14Wow, this is the perfect way to experience Paris.
09:21Of course, it has changed a lot since the Middle Ages.
09:24I can see the Sainte-Chapelle, that's one of the very last masterpieces in the Middle
09:29Ages which survived.
09:33It used to be the Chapel of Kings, part of the city's original palace.
09:39It is famed around the world for its stunning stained glass windows, which cover an amazing
09:43two-thirds of the surface area of the chapel.
09:49There's another medieval building which is much less well-known, but every bit as important
09:54to getting to know the lost city.
09:57It's the house we saw from the police boat.
10:00I've been keen to visit it ever since Majorou pointed it out.
10:08It's the scene of the most romantic story in the history of Paris.
10:12The story of Abelard and Héloïse, our very own Romeo and Juliet, set in the 12th century.
10:22It's quite amazing being here, quite unique, because there are so few rooms left from the
10:27Middle Ages in Paris, and it's where the scholars used to live and study, very close to the
10:33cathedral.
10:34You can see the wooden panels still sculpted.
10:41It's fantastic.
10:44Abelard was a very brilliant philosopher in the Middle Ages, and Héloïse was the niece
10:50of Fulbert, who was the canon of Notre-Dame.
10:53And they met, they fell in love, they married secretly, they had a child, and Fulbert was
10:58really mad with anger, and had Abelard castrated and Héloïse sent to a convent.
11:09The blighted couple never met again, though they exchanged many love letters.
11:13Their passion had brought them disgrace, and the most vicious punishment.
11:35Medieval Paris was a city of extremes, a hotbed of culture and violence.
11:45The centuries to follow were times of war, disease and turbulence.
11:53Several rulers tried to turn the tide against chaos, but failed.
11:59Paris was waiting for my favourite king, Henry IV, who came to the throne in 1589.
12:05Henry IV is the archetype of the good king, because he brought the peace, the tolerance
12:11and wealth to the country, and he also had a great vision for the city.
12:15We call the 17th century our greatest, Le Grand Siècle, and it's partly thanks to him.
12:25Like so many French rulers, he wanted to ring the changes in a big way.
12:31But this wasn't just about making Paris look good, it was about bringing culture and creating
12:36jobs and homes for his subjects, in style.
12:44To see what Henry was trying to do, just head to the Place des Vosges in the Marais district.
13:00Henry IV wanted to make Paris one of the jewels of Europe, so he gave us this magnificent
13:05square.
13:07It's one of the city's hidden glories, just off the beaten track and easily missed.
13:15It was inspired by the colonnaded squares of Italy's great Renaissance cities.
13:19Henry was determined to rid Paris of its medieval image, so the builders were not allowed to
13:24use timber, only stone and brick.
13:28When it was first built, it must have looked so modern and imposing, among all the timber-framed
13:33hovels.
13:34No wonder it soon became the most glamorous and fashionable place to live.
13:42Here it's one of my favourite places in Paris.
13:44I used to come here with my friend, Françoise, we used to live rue Saint-Paul, not far away
13:49from here, and we used to come here, you see, reading, just chatting away, having a sandwich.
13:58And it hasn't changed, I often come back.
14:01And it's the perfect Sunday promenade, it's one of those few places in Paris which are
14:07very peaceful and I like them.
14:10Just talking about those buildings, they're absolutely elegant, I've never been inside.
14:16Our fantasy, I think, has always been to have a place here, but as you can expect, it's
14:22very expensive and I think none of them are on sale.
14:29So I guess I would have to win the lottery then.
14:34The most sought-after location in the square has always been the house Henry IV reserved
14:39for himself.
14:41Today, the top-floor apartment is the home of a doctor, Pablo Goldsmiths.
14:48Wow, this is an absolutely amazing view, come on, I've never seen such a view like that.
14:58Yes, we have the whole view because it's the highest point on the Place.
15:02Do you have like a special bond to this place, to decide to live here?
15:09Yes, I was very lucky to get it.
15:13It's very interesting the way that if you are here in the middle, you see that it's
15:15like a mirror, so you can reflect one part on the other and also you see.
15:21Perfect symmetry, yes.
15:23But it's not a square, it's divided in the sense that if you look from here, none of
15:29the houses are the same.
15:30If you start from the middle to the left and you see the roof, all the windows are different
15:35in the roof, but if you see also the first floor and the second, the height of every
15:39window is different.
15:40It's interesting because they're all different, but when you look at them all together, they
15:44look so...
15:45Yes, the atmosphere makes like it's a homogeneous...
15:46The harmony, yes.
15:47It's an homogeneous structure, but they're absolutely different.
15:50God, you know, I didn't know all those things, I didn't realize all those things.
15:54I used to come here as a student with a friend and just blah, blah, blah, talking on the
15:59benches.
16:00Yes.
16:01It's amazing because actually there are so, so few just green spaces in Paris and you
16:08are the heart of Paris, but also look at that, you're just having a superb square in front
16:13of you.
16:16Sadly, Henri never did move into his new home.
16:21He died just before the building was completed.
16:33His plans for Paris were driven by the need to reunite the city after it had been torn
16:39apart by the wars of religion between Catholics and Protestants.
16:44He literally needed to build bridges.
16:50The Pont Neuf was the great icon of Paris, in a way the Eiffel Tower of its time.
16:55It was modern, elegant and a symbol of unity.
17:01Completed while Henri was still alive, the Pont Neuf became a vital link between the
17:05right and left banks.
17:09Now it's one of the most romantic places in Paris.
17:13I don't know what it is about the bridges of Paris that makes them so romantic.
17:18Perhaps it's the way the sun rises and sets along the river.
17:23It's long been the perfect place to fall in love, but even the Pont Neuf is changing.
17:32Over the past 12 years, it has been under continuous restoration, overseen by engineer
17:38Ambroise Dufayet.
17:40So you changed all the stones?
17:42Yes, we changed all the stones of the arches, except for the stones we see here, which have
17:48been preserved.
17:49But all the upper stones have been removed and replaced with stones.
17:55There are a lot of architectural details.
17:57We can see the presence of these mascarons, which are unique on a bridge in Freemasonry.
18:04Many of the 384 mascarons were so badly weathered that they had to be replaced with new copies.
18:12In fact, over the centuries, almost all the bridge has been rebuilt.
18:19Paris' oldest bridge, called the New Bridge, is now, well, a new bridge all over again.
18:33Soon after it opened, the area around the Pont Neuf became known for wild parties.
18:51It was always the place to have fun, comedians, jugglers and singers.
19:02Parisian street entertainment has a long and rich history, dating back as far as the Middle Ages.
19:09My friends play in a modern street band called Borsalino.
19:33I like to see all these musicians in the street, it's very nice.
19:40Yes, that's what we try to perpetuate.
19:42Despite the winter, we still play outside.
19:44Not bad, Place des Vosges, for the fact that it is sheltered.
19:47Otherwise, we are a bit of a time tributary.
19:50You are the last bohemians of Paris, then.
19:53In a way, we perpetuate a bit near Pont Neuf, where the war started.
20:03But there was a sinister side to Henri's Paris, its crime-ridden slums.
20:09His biggest challenge was to impose law and order on the streets of his capital.
20:17Even today, there are areas in the city that make me feel very uneasy at night.
20:26I wouldn't normally walk around here.
20:29In Henri's time, you really would have been asking for trouble.
20:38There was really no excuse to be ripped off or robbed,
20:42because the street names told you exactly what to expect.
20:48Rue de la Grande Truanderie, big rascal street.
20:51La Rue des Mauvais Garçons, bad boy street.
20:55Rue Mouffetard, stench street.
20:58There were a lot of stinky streets.
21:00Rue Merdeler, Rue Chieu, Rue Chiar, Rue Merdeur.
21:05They were all streets smelling of excrement.
21:10But these weren't the worst.
21:11They were even more graphic and vulgar names that have long since been changed.
21:18Rue Coupe-Gueule, cutthroat street.
21:20Rue Petit Muse, strolling whore street.
21:23Rue du Petit Cue, Rue du Gros Cue, Rue du Gras de Cue.
21:26Small bum, big bum, scratchy bum street.
21:29Whatever takes your fancy, really.
21:40Henri did his best to clean up the streets.
21:42He increased the city guard and tried to feed and protect the poor.
21:47In the end, the mean streets devoured the king himself.
21:50On the 14th of May 1610, Henri IV was travelling in his carriage
21:55along Rue de la Fornerie, over there.
21:59Lying in wait in the shadows was a religious zealot called François Ravaillac,
22:03hell-bent on killing the king.
22:06His chance came when Henri's carriage had to pull up.
22:11Ravaillac pounced and plunged his dagger three times in the king's heart.
22:15Nobody would believe he was a lone maniac.
22:17But even under the torture, he wouldn't admit he was working for Henri's Catholic enemies.
22:26So that's how the beloved Henri met his bloody end.
22:30But he had done the important work.
22:32He'd laid the foundations and now others followed.
22:35Paris's reputation was transformed as it became famous
22:39for its countless new palatial homes.
22:46They were mainly built in the 17th century in an area called the Marais.
22:50Known as the Hôtel Particulier, they belonged to the city's aristocrats.
22:54But don't be confused, they weren't hotels as we know them now.
22:57Because back then, it meant a grand city mansion.
23:01MUSIC
23:21Of all the hotels of the Marais,
23:23the Hôtel Carnavalet is the most elegant and the most fascinating.
23:28With its idyllic gardens and courtyards,
23:30this was aristocratic chic at its best.
23:34The Hôtel Carnavalet is now the Museum of Paris,
23:37but there is something else which draws me here.
23:40It was home to one of the most extraordinary women ever to live in Paris,
23:44the Marquise de Sévigné.
23:51This was the era of the Salon,
23:53literary and artistic gatherings run by cultured and aristocratic women.
23:59The Marquise was one of the most influential.
24:02She was friends with great writers like Molière and La Fontaine.
24:06And she is remembered for her own writings too,
24:09particularly her letters to her daughter.
24:17So this is a copy of the letters by Madame de Sévigné.
24:22She wrote to her daughter
24:24about the Parisian high society in the 17th century.
24:29And it's quite cracking actually sometimes.
24:32It's quite entertaining and gossipy.
24:34She would have sayings like,
24:36the heart has no wrinkles
24:38or fortune is always on the side of the big battalions.
24:42One of my favourite bits
24:44is that she used to be absolutely crazy about chocolate just like me
24:48and she was absolutely fascinated by it.
24:50She used to write about it to her daughter,
24:53like if you're not feeling well, if you have not slept,
24:56chocolate will revive you.
24:58But she also worried that it would cause vapours and palpitations.
25:12Chocolate was the great new fad among the aristocracy.
25:15It was healthy, sexy and very elitist.
25:19And the Parisian love affair with chocolate
25:21shows no sign of abating.
25:25The annual Salon du Chocolat
25:27is a major event on the city calendar.
25:31Chocolate arrived in France
25:33during the reign of Henry VIII.
25:44Soon the Chocolat du Roi party
25:46was the must-have invitation among the very rich.
25:50You've got all sorts of chocolate.
25:52The posh chocolate,
25:54the bio chocolate, the organic chocolate,
25:56the fun chocolate, the industrial chocolate.
26:02There's even a brand of chocolate
26:04named after the Marquise de Sévigné.
26:06I'm going to taste it.
26:12I can't really speak at the same time.
26:14It's 70% of cacao.
26:17And it's very fondant.
26:19I don't know how you say that,
26:21like very melting, but it's lovely, very lovely.
26:26Chocolate was very exclusive.
26:29Cocoa beans and sugar were both so expensive
26:32only members of the royal court could afford them.
26:37This is the quintessence of the chocolate.
26:40Look at that.
26:41It looks like a ring box
26:44and you've got one chocolate inside.
27:11Close to heaven.
27:14Chocolate was thought to be good for you.
27:16Doctors prescribed it for indigestion
27:19and even for broken hearts.
27:23Sorry, but I need a glass of champagne to go with the chocolate.
27:27Merci.
27:29OK, the chocolate fondue,
27:32fontaine de chocolat over there.
27:35Oh la la, on s'en lasse pas.
27:47The highlight of the evening is a fashion show
27:50featuring celebrities and models adorned with chocolate.
27:57One reason everyone loves chocolate so much
28:00is because it's so easy to make.
28:02One reason everyone loves chocolate so much
28:04was because it was a great aphrodisiac.
28:10The Marquis de Sade used to serve it at his orgies
28:13and Casanova called it the elixir of love.
28:21Queen Maria Theresa said only two things mattered to her,
28:24chocolate and the king.
28:26In that order.
28:28This was a rather astonishing thing to say
28:30considering her husband was the most famous French king of all,
28:33Louis XIV, the Sun King himself.
28:45Paris prides itself as being in the avant-garde of many things,
28:49a trendsetter for the world.
28:51If there is one man who laid down the blueprint of modern Paris,
28:55it's Louis XIV, the ultimate absolutist ruler.
29:01The grandson of Henry IV,
29:04he planned to make Paris the greatest city the world had ever known.
29:14During his 72-year reign,
29:17Louis built new canals to boost trade
29:20and introduced the Grand Boulevard,
29:23which have come to define Paris.
29:26He demolished the city's medieval walls
29:29and erected triumphal arches,
29:31like the Porte Saint-Denis,
29:33as statements of his power and glory.
29:43The poorest of the poor were nowhere to be seen in Louis' Paris.
29:47They lived here, on the left bank,
29:49in the hospital of Pitié-Salpêtrière.
29:56You might recognise the name.
29:58It is where Princess Diana died in 1997.
30:03Now it's the biggest hospital in Europe,
30:06but then it was the bleakest place in the city.
30:12When it was built,
30:14this wasn't a hospital in the true sense of the word.
30:17It had less to do with charity and more to do with social control.
30:26The hospital chapel reflects Louis' grandiose plans,
30:30but behind its impressive façade lies a disturbing truth.
30:39Louis was determined to cleanse the streets
30:42of the beggars, prostitutes and mentally ill
30:45who spoiled the glorious image of the Sun King and his capital.
30:505,000 lost souls were locked up here in appalling conditions.
31:05The mentally ill were chained to the walls.
31:09This was the city at its most divided.
31:13A world away, on the other side of the river,
31:16Louis lavishly revamped the royal palace.
31:24The Louvre was given a majestic new façade
31:27and a new facade was added to it.
31:30It was the first of its kind in Paris.
31:33It was the first of its kind in Paris.
31:36It was the first of its kind in Paris.
31:40The Louvre was given a majestic new façade,
31:43emblazoned with his own image.
31:49Inside, it created one of the most flamboyant rooms in Paris.
31:55So, we are now in the Galerie d'Apollon.
31:58The Sun King chose the Sun God to represent himself.
32:02As you can see, the architecture here is magnificent, opulent and stately.
32:07Art and architecture for Louis XIV had to serve one purpose,
32:10the glory of the king.
32:22This type of art isn't to everyone's taste.
32:25You might say it's over-the-top, a bit like Louis himself.
32:29Back then, all monarchs believed they were chosen by God,
32:32but he had an especially high opinion of himself.
32:38L'Etat, c'est moi, he famously said.
32:41I am the state.
32:50The Galerie turned out to be a prototype
32:52for something much grander in scale and ambition,
32:55the Palace of Versailles.
33:01Louis' immense palace, 24km from Paris,
33:04was the largest and most expensive France had ever seen.
33:08It was a celebration of luxury and extravagance.
33:12Louis wanted the best of everything,
33:14art, furniture, carpets and tapestries.
33:19This was a huge boost for Parisian industry.
33:28One of the main beneficiaries was the Gobelin factory on the left bank,
33:32which became world-famous for its tapestries.
33:35It was the brainchild of Louis' right-hand man,
33:38Jean-Baptiste Colbert,
33:40to take over the Gobelin in the name of the crown.
33:46Gobelin's mission was to create fine art on an industrial scale.
33:51Colbert wanted to make Paris the world capital of style and taste.
33:56And this being France, our industrial revolution
33:59specialised in the production of beautiful things.
34:04The Gobelin and the nearby Savonnerie Carpet Factory
34:08became the pride of the nation, and they still are.
34:11To this day, the French government spares no expense
34:14to keep these arts alive.
34:17We're inside the manufacturer here,
34:19and he hasn't changed since the 17th century.
34:22And he hasn't changed since the 17th century.
34:25They're using the same techniques.
34:27It's quite amazing.
34:30And they're all so diverse.
34:32They carry on doing commission from the state.
34:35So, when it was for Louis XIV,
34:38so even in the 18th century, it was more mythical subjects,
34:42and now it's more modern artists.
34:52Do you work in pairs on a tapestry?
34:54In fact, practically all these tapestries are for two people.
34:58And to make a piece, how long does it take?
35:01The minimum is two years,
35:05and the maximum can go up to four, five years.
35:09It depends on the size of the piece,
35:11the finesse and the difficulty.
35:18I'll let you work, I won't bother you anymore.
35:21Merci.
35:31Colbert had another great scheme
35:33for making money for the king, fashion.
35:38This is when France's reputation for haute couture began,
35:41and the exotic fashions of Versailles
35:44still inspire some of today's top designers.
35:48Among them, Christian Lacroix.
35:50In a recent collection, he brought the royal court back to life.
35:57Colbert used to say,
35:59fashion is to France what the gold mines of Peru are to Spain.
36:03I think that he was very inspired by promoting.
36:10It was not just for the sake of fashion or the sake of art.
36:14It was, of course, commercial sake.
36:17During the Colbert period,
36:19some people were travelling in the court in Austria, Germany, Russia,
36:25with little dolls with costumes made by Paris couturiers.
36:34The dolls helped spread Parisian fashions across Europe,
36:37but the industry really took off in the 18th century,
36:41when Queen Marie Antoinette, the wife of Louis XVI,
36:44became the world's first supermodel.
36:47Portraits of her wearing the latest design
36:50were the equivalent of a Vogue magazine cover.
36:55Is it actually Marie Antoinette who launched this idea
36:58of having a seasonal collection or some events collection?
37:02Yes, it was a daily collection for Marie Antoinette.
37:05Yeah, I know, actually.
37:07Because she changed almost every day.
37:09Actually, people in Versailles
37:11spend a real fortune to just look like the Queen.
37:14Oh, yes.
37:15And I think that they didn't dare to be exactly the same,
37:18but very inspired.
37:19When you look at this, it's like Marie Antoinette embroidery.
37:23I wanted to say, that's taken from Versailles already.
37:26Almost, yes.
37:27And it's very inspired by the Queen.
37:29And these velvets were made as it was during the 17th century.
37:35It's not obvious in this dress,
37:37but I like to mix and match
37:40modern and ancient, the past and the present and the future.
37:44In this collection, I was much more focused on the past.
37:52Versailles may have been the most glamorous court in Europe,
37:55but it was decadent and divorced from reality.
37:58What did that mean for Paris?
38:00It had been abandoned by the King,
38:02so it was no longer the centre of power.
38:06But left to its own devices,
38:08the city became a breeding ground for radical new ideas.
38:12For the first time in Paris' history,
38:14change threatened to come not from the top,
38:17but from the bottom, from the people.
38:29Paris had its very own alternative court
38:32just across the road from the Louvre.
38:36While the King and the Queen print and pose in Versailles,
38:39the people had their own playground.
38:41The Palais Royal was a centre for hedonists and libertines.
38:53The Palais Royal was the home of the Duke of Orleans,
38:56a playboy and cousin of the King.
38:59He turned it into a pleasure palace,
39:01an 18th-century shopping mall
39:03famous for its exclusive stores, cafes and gambling dens.
39:07But most of all, it was famous for brothels.
39:14Here's a book actually compiling, in the 18th century,
39:18the lists of all the ladies of the night.
39:21So the listing is quite informative
39:23because you've got the complete list of the most beautiful women
39:27and the healthiest in the Palais de Paris,
39:32which is here, Palais Royal.
39:34For Grandville, Picante Brunette, quite nice, beautiful body.
39:39Her price was three livres.
39:41Hortense, Hortense, 20-year-old woman, ugly, quite spiritual.
39:47And she was cheap, she was only one livre, 10 soles.
39:50Much more expensive now, Mademoiselle Merci,
39:53big blonde, libertine, but not a lot of wit.
39:57Her price was 12 livres.
39:59And on and on and on and on.
40:03They were kept in brothels, what we used to call also the serrailles.
40:08Some of the serrailles were among those windows you can see around.
40:12And some men would just visit the serrailles
40:15and just disappear with one of the ladies.
40:19My only regret is we don't have a similar one for men.
40:23Paris had always been a magnet for people seeking and selling sex.
40:27But now something extraordinary happened.
40:30Sex and politics came together
40:32in a way that would change the way we live and love forever.
40:37The new sexual revolutionaries were known as libertines.
40:41And the most famous of all was the Marquis de Sade.
40:45One of the authorities on these outrageous times is Ovidie,
40:49a film director, writer and former porn star.
40:52A modern-day libertine.
41:15We only remember that because it was the most excessive.
41:19He was imprisoned for 30 years.
41:22His first imprisonment was due to an abuse in a closed house.
41:28So an abuse in a closed house, we wonder what that means.
41:31It's sad because the libertine, the most famous one in France,
41:35was very bothered by the libertinism of the previous century, the 17th century.
41:41De Sade rejected religion to pursue sexual delights.
41:45This might not sound subversive today,
41:47but back then it meant he was rejecting the king who was chosen by God.
41:58In the 18th century, God was coming under attack from all sides.
42:03We call it the siècle des lumières, the century of light.
42:07You call it the Enlightenment.
42:10There's a very special place on the left bank
42:13where Enlightenment ideas really took hold.
42:20What started as a private garden for the king
42:23went on to become the home of French science.
42:27The Jardin Royal des Plantes had been created
42:30to grow medicinal plants for the court.
42:33But with the king away in Versailles,
42:35it became a battleground between science and religion.
42:42Professor of chemistry Bernard Baudot works here,
42:45where some of the most important scientific discoveries
42:48in the history of mankind have been made.
42:52This is a magical place.
42:54It's in one of these roundabouts.
42:56Chevrolle, in 1813, discovered cholesterol.
43:00And if you look around this house,
43:03this is where Henri Becquerel discovered radioactivity in uranium cells.
43:08As you say, there are a lot of geniuses here.
43:11Even from the 18th century, you can see that.
43:15It's a magical place.
43:18Didro was a star of the Enlightenment.
43:21Opposed to the church and superstition,
43:24his encyclopaedia celebrated reason and science.
43:30A trained chemist, he knew every plant in this garden.
43:34One of the most important plants in the garden
43:37was the rose.
43:40This is an Arabica coffee.
43:42The coffees are native to Ethiopia.
43:45They were introduced to Arabia.
43:47It was the mayor of Amsterdam
43:49who gave the coffee plant to King Louis XIV.
43:53It's a purely plant-based coffee.
43:55Yes, it's a plant-based coffee.
43:57It's a plant-based coffee.
43:59It's a plant-based coffee.
44:01It's a plant-based coffee.
44:03It's a plant-based coffee.
44:06The place was named after Dikany,
44:09who had a company in Cyprus,
44:11and here is the Royal Castle park.
44:13Here is the Royal Castle park.
44:27The Prokop Cafe in the left Bank
44:29is an old humble cafe,
44:31where warm coffee and tart
44:34is an old haunt of mine you really mustn't miss.
44:38Opened in 1686 by a Sicilian called Procopio,
44:41this was the city's first cafe.
44:45It really set a trend.
44:46Within a few decades,
44:48there were 200 and eventually 40,000.
44:51Paris, city of cafes.
44:56Cafe is French for coffee.
44:59It was much less exclusive than chocolate
45:01and popular among the middle classes.
45:34From the French at the time of the revolution
45:36until today, because even today,
45:39politicians still come, artists still come,
45:42literary people still come.
45:45Thank you.
45:46You're welcome.
45:46Goodbye.
45:47Have a good day.
45:47You too.
45:52You wouldn't be a self-respected French person
45:54if you're not having your strong black coffee in the morning.
45:57And cafe culture is very famous here, of course,
46:00in Paris and the rest of France.
46:02And what I like about this cafe culture,
46:05it's what actually I miss when I'm abroad.
46:06The first thing, after food, of course,
46:09is that it's very, at the same time, social,
46:12but it can be also private.
46:13And I remember as a student,
46:15I used to come here and just staying for hours in a cafe,
46:19just paying for one cafe,
46:22and just having all my books and folders and files
46:25all spread out like that on the table.
46:29In the 18th century, studies and conversations of a coffee
46:32would change the world.
46:35The Procop attracted some of the great philosophers of the time,
46:39Diderot, Voltaire and Rousseau,
46:42the forefathers of modern ideas of liberty and democracy.
46:46So the philosophers would come here, sit,
46:48and discuss all the ideas of the Siècle des Lumières.
46:52I can just imagine them here.
46:54And all those philosophers were followed
46:57by a much more radical generation of revolutionaries
47:00like Danton, Marin and Robespierre,
47:02who plotted the fall of the monarchy.
47:07Paris was about to undergo
47:09the most cataclysmic upheaval in its history.
47:15The seeds of revolution were sown on the left bank,
47:18but it finally erupted on the right bank
47:21on July 14, 1789.
47:29On that day, an angry mob attacked the notorious Bastille prison
47:33in the east of the city.
47:45The Bastille used to stand here.
47:47The outline is...
47:49..marked on the road.
47:51Like a murder victim.
47:53Now my mission is to go back safely to shore.
48:01I might just go very quickly before being run down.
48:11So where I'm sitting now used to be inside the Bastille.
48:15And the Bastille is, of course,
48:17the symbol of the revolution, but it's also a myth.
48:20On the 14th of July, only seven people were freed
48:23and it was then destroyed by the crowd,
48:26but later on dismantled by a demolition team.
48:33The salvage was sold off as souvenirs,
48:36but despite all the myth-making,
48:38what happened here in 1789 didn't just change Paris,
48:42it changed the whole world.
48:48This is where the modern age began.
48:55On August 26, 1789,
48:57the French National Assembly, or Parliament,
49:00drew up the epoch-making Rights of Man.
49:11Let me see.
49:13So this is the Déclaration des Droits de l'Homme,
49:16made on the 3rd of September, 1791.
49:20It goes...
49:25So men, all men, are born and remain free and equal in rights.
49:31It's interesting to see that all over the world
49:34this declaration of the human rights
49:36is considered like the touchstone of individual freedom.
49:40And I'm really proud of that.
49:44MUSIC
49:52Paris will always be known
49:54as the first world capital of revolution.
49:57Some of us take it for granted, I certainly don't.
50:02You have to defend your liberty if you want to enjoy it.
50:06CROWD SHOUTS
50:14Some things never change.
50:17The issues are different,
50:19but Parisians still don't hold back
50:21when it comes to venting anger and frustration.
50:31Sometimes things get violent.
50:38In November 2005,
50:40there were riots in the suburbs of Paris,
50:43which spread all over France.
50:50While some burned cars and fought the police,
50:53others, like rap band Sniper, turned to music,
50:56calling on young people to stand up for their rights.
50:59MUSIC
51:06In my opinion, the song La France was quite revolutionary.
51:09Do you think there are parallels
51:11between what happened in 1789 and now?
51:15Rap is a kind of music...
51:18Yes, of protest.
51:20It's a kind of protest music.
51:23MUSIC
51:27You could say it's revolutionary,
51:30because we call on young people to do their duty as citizens.
51:36That's what I was going to say.
51:39Even if it's not by going to the Place de la Bastille
51:43and doing the revolution,
51:46it's a way of being heard,
51:49a way of rebelling.
51:52MUSIC
51:56The French government sued Sniper
51:58for allegedly racist and insulting lyrics,
52:01which incited violence.
52:06After four trials, the band was acquitted.
52:27MUSIC
52:38In the wake of 1789,
52:40almost every single landmark in Paris was reinvented,
52:44courtesy of the revolution.
52:47Notre-Dame became a warehouse and had its statues beheaded.
52:51Saint-Chapelle became a grain store.
52:55The Louvre became a museum for the people.
52:59The Jardin Royal des Plantes was reinvented
53:01as the National History Museum.
53:04The original statue of Henry IV on the Pont Neuf
53:07was melted down to make cannon.
53:10The condemned awaiting execution
53:12were imprisoned at the Conciergerie.
53:14One of them was Marie-Antoinette.
53:16Marie-Antoinette was guillotined here, Place de la Concorde,
53:19along with her husband, Louis XVI, and thousands of others.
53:27The guillotine is named after Dr Guillotin, a Parisian.
53:31Today, you can find one of these deadly machines
53:34in the most unlikely of settings,
53:36a jazz bar on the left bank.
53:39Hello, I wanted to ask you why you have a guillotine here.
53:42This guillotine was bought in Lyon in 1920
53:45in a auction that dates back to 1793.
53:48It's a guillotine from the French army
53:50that fought the War of the Horses.
53:52It's a removable guillotine.
53:54The blade weighs 37 kilos.
53:56It's the only visible guillotine in France.
53:58So you have the only guillotine in Paris.
54:00The only visible guillotine.
54:02OK.
54:03It's the only guillotine in Paris.
54:05The guillotine was used for the first time in 1792,
54:08but it's actually not Dr Guillotin who invented it.
54:11It was used by the Italians before then.
54:14And...
54:16Yeah, it's quite chilling, actually, to be next to it.
54:19Cheers.
54:36Marie-Antoinette and Louis XVI
54:39were finally buried at the Basilica of Saint-Denis
54:42in the northern suburbs of Paris.
54:52Proclamons le moustère de la foi.
55:01It's a bit of a mystery.
55:04It's a bit of a journey from the city centre,
55:07but well worth the effort.
55:09This is one of the city's treasures,
55:11the resting place of French kings.
55:20The monarchy is long dead and gone,
55:22but whatever you think about it,
55:24it's still an important part of our past.
55:28The most touching thing is the Chapel of the Princes.
55:31In those caskets are some of the remains of French kings,
55:35including Louis XIV and Henry IV,
55:38the two men who did so much to build Paris,
55:41now side by side in death.
55:49But it wasn't just the great and good who suffered.
55:52People from all walks of life
55:54lost their heads during the bloodiest phase,
55:57the terror which was unleashed by Maximilien de Robespierre in 1793.
56:06Many of the victims ended up in the catacombs
56:09in the south of Paris.
56:13Arrête, c'est ici, l'Empire de la Mort.
56:16Stop, this is the Empire of Death.
56:19Stop, this is the Empire of Death.
56:22This could be a good metaphor for Paris during the Terror.
56:30This is the most macabre gallery in the world,
56:33over one kilometre of eerie passageways
56:36stacked high with skulls and bones.
56:39The catacombs had been created just before the Revolution
56:43to clear the city's overcrowded cemeteries.
56:50The terror brought wave after wave of corpses,
56:53of people from all classes.
56:55One victim famously asked,
56:57Freedom, how many crimes are committed in your name?
57:01And the answer was,
57:03One victim famously asked,
57:05Freedom, how many crimes are committed in your name?
57:09This was the revolution gone most horribly wrong.
57:15Robespierre ended up here too,
57:17after he was guillotined.
57:19Poetic justice.
57:23As well as Robespierre, there are his fellow revolutionaries,
57:26Marat and Danton.
57:30Don't ask me to introduce them to you,
57:32because they're among six million nameless Parisians here.
58:03The French Revolution changed Paris and the world forever.
58:07The city faced a very uncertain future,
58:10but it would triumph against the odds.
58:13And become the world's first modern city,
58:16a magnet to people the world over.
58:21Next time, Bohemia, cinema, the metro,
58:24the occupation and new horizons.
58:27Paris in the 20th century and today.
58:33From the inside story of the biggest jailbreak
58:36in British and Irish history,
58:38to the last voices of D-Day.
58:40Remarkable tales of the past in the History Podcast.
58:43Listen on BBC Sounds.