In all the Grand Apartments were
hangings and furniture of extraordinary richness. There were tables of
gilded wood and mosaic, Florentine marbles, pedestals of porphyry for
vases of precious metal, ebony cabinets inlaid with copper, columns of
jasper, agate and lapis lazuli, silver chandeliers, branched
candle-sticks, baskets, vessels for liqueurs, silver perfuming pans.
Windows were draped with silver brocade worked in gold thread, with
Venetian silks and satins, or embroideries from the Gobelin studios.
On the floors, originally of marble, were spread carpets woven in
designs symbolical of kingly power.
The Throne Room known as the Salon of Apollo--the seat of the Sun
King--was of the utmost richness. The throne itself was of silver and
stood eight feet high. Tapestries represented scenes of splendor in
the life of Louis the Great and on the walls were masterpieces by
Italian artists of the first rank, which were later deemed worthy of a
place in the Louvre. Much of the treasure vanished in the years
1689-1690 when the King was constrained to raise money for his depleted
treasury. In December, 1682, the _Mercure Galant_, desirous of
pleasing its readers, always avid of details about everything that
concerned their King, published a long description of the furnishings
of the State Apartments--the velvet hangings, the marble walls enriched
with gold relief, the chimney-pieces bossed with silver.
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