Queen Bérengère Museum – Wikipedia
The Queen Bérengère Museum is a building bringing together ethnological collections in the city of Le Mans and the Maine region.
The building dates from XV It is century and remains in a remarkable state of conservation. It is located in the center of the narrow streets of the Plantagenêt city. His name is taken from Bérengère de Navarre, wife of Richard Coeur de Lion. She was a dowager of Le Mans, where she founded the shoulder abbey, and lived with her husband at the Palais des Counts du Maine, the current town hall. The place has the Museum of France label.
The museum is located on the old Large street which served in the Middle Ages the entire medieval city, whether canonial and aristocratic residences, or alleys of “low district”. The museum is made up of three wooden sides. Popular belief wants the queen to have returned the soul in one of these houses, remains completely bourgeois for the time, in 1230. The house was entirely rebuilt by rich merchants manceaux, the Véron, at the end of XV It is century. At number 9, the so -called “Annunciation” house has a specific architecture. Her name comes from this very special facade that she has. Statuettes representing the Virgin and the Angel Gabriel are sculpted. The style is very clearly Italian with vases, arabesques or plant windings. Then the house of the draper at number 7 has it, a very important sander carved with a ram unrolling her fleece in undulations on which various characters appear. The building is classified as historic monuments [ 2 ] .
At XIX It is Century, the houses were abandoned when the state classified them “Historic Monuments” and they were bought by a certain Adolphe Singher (1836-1910). Basically, it is his personal collections of work of art that reside in the three buildings. Then the city acquired the whole to make it a first presentation room, opened to the public in 1924.
Before and after the Second World War, the city worked to make the museum a place of local memory, in particular by the collection and storage of ceramic objects whose discoveries are abundant during many archaeological excavations in the departments of Sarthe and Mayenne. The works of the surgeon-step-in-law Pierre-Innoncent Guimonneau de la Fortrie, dating from XVIII It is Century (1726-1794) or the craft pitches of Louis-Léopold Thuiland are spearheads of a large collection. Then we must select the “typically Sarthois” furniture, which will allow the evocation of the rural life of Sarthe, especially in XIX It is century, period of boom in the department. The battle paintings, like that of the Place de la République, or the portraits and the genre scenes gradually come to fill the collection. Also appear works out of nowhere, but incredible from realism as picturesque views of the old mans or the shores of the Sarthe and the urbanized quays of Le Mans of XVIII It is And XIX It is centuries, then filled with laundry boats.
The house at XIX It is century [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
Long before the birth of the museum, the rehabilitation of the house responded to a nineteen-neuvièmist enthusiasm Troubadours . The house was rediscovered from a different angle thanks to a lithography of Alexandre Boyot, resulted in a work of the name of Picturesque Middle Ages . At the time, what was supposed to be the old house of the Queen was just a simple shop. Many of the antique dealers have damaged the house at a lower cost: in 1836, one of them bought eight of the sumptuous exterior statuettes of the house to make it … table feet! Nevertheless, the city of Le Mans already began to negotiate with the owners of the old residences to prepare an ethnological collection of Maine. But in 1852 for example, it was the Musée de Cluny which obtained two mancelle chimneys from the beginning of XV It is century. In front of this unprecedented mutilation of the historic district, the mayor then, Louis Cordelet decides to take measures. But these are late. The two houses that form the museum today are classified as historic monuments only . The protected residences, the bad spell is relentless again on the building since an involuntary fire attacks the back of the Renaissance house as well as a wooden turret. The then owner, mythomaniac as possible, calls his home the “Palais de la Reine Bérengère”. More or less chased by the city authorities, he gave it to the architect Bastard before the latter sold it to Adolphe Singher, director of the Mans mutuals, in .
Adolphe Singher becomes a lover transi from Renaissance architecture. Its ambition is to restore to the house its appearance of XV It is And XVI It is centuries. To do this, important work is undertaken, the first of which concerns the damage of the last fire, as well as the framework of the Renaissance house. In order to get back on the facade on the streets, he finds the statues torn off, bought at gold prices in a castle in the Orne. The biggest problem remains for the fireplace, since it is impossible to deprive the museum of Cluny of its two Gothic fireplaces. Singher ends up obtaining a molding reproducing one of them. Specialized circles praise such restorations, starting with Art for all which offered its readers in 1893, two boards detailing the whole house. Adolphe Singher published in 1898 the catalog of his collections: he is no less than 70 pages. Already Singher likes to show his collections to which asks him. These are the beginnings of the museum. The house definitively becomes that of a lord of five centuries.
The first opening and the first collection [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
The Queen Bérengère museum opened the , National Day, at 10 a.m. Many objects come from a generous gift from Madame Liger, widow of a large Manceau collector whose statue adorns the courtyard. The first collections consist on the ground floor of a large seigniorial bench on which is a canopy as we do not do anymore. The chests of the first piece are full of medieval statues of all kinds. Is also a virgin of stone dating from the XIV It is century. In front of the seigniorial bench, there is a large -scale tapestry: 4 meters forty it occupies a whole bench in the room. This vast hanging dates from Louis XII and presents the room of a nobleman where there are no less than 26 guests. On the nuptial bed, a woman is about to die. The tapestry finds her place perfectly in the house of Bérengère, she who wanted to die so much with her husband by her side.
Upstairs is in one part the Oratory of the Lord, on the other the seigneurial chamber; These two parts are separated from each other by an authentic partition in wooden panel wood. In front of the fireplace, an original Spanish altarpiece dating from the XV It is century takes place. In the center of the room, a desk has an authentic book of Gregorian songs. In the Lord’s room, we find the perfect paraphernalia of the knight. On the second floor, the large bedroom has two chimneys and is the most representative of the feudal residence of XVI It is century. In the center of the room, a Burgundian beam as well as a bed with a fluted column. The third floor is of course reserved for small objects. It must be said that the third floor is that of the frame. This room will be preserved for a long time as The Bureau of the Collector Manceau With large table, armchair and goldsmithery exposed.
Paintings [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
There are notably four paintings by the painter Manceau Théodore Boulard, born in 1887. The latter painted with great realism the peasant atmosphere specific to agriculture in the north of Le Mans. The work of the fields or the passage of the seasons is its favorite themes. We thus find at the museum three oils on canvas of the first third of the XX It is century : The evening soup , Before the Trut game and the Couple of peasants at the church . Finally a donation from the mayor of Le Mans occurred in 2006 to restore the museum an oil on cardboard named At the window . You can also find an oil on canvas of Valentine’s Day Berthelemy dating from 1893: After coffee .
We also find overall “Paintings”, a room specially dedicated to the Sarthoise cap, very specific. The “Gouline” is the only headdress not represented on the paintings present. However, there is in particular a Portrait of Luie de Loyac , Marquise d’Agout painted by Félicité Hervé. Then two portraits of elderly women or servants are notable, by Julien Chappée from 1896 ( Portrait of Madeleine Morans ) and Théodore Boulard ( The evening soup ).
Finally, the life and Sarthoise life of the last century revolves around the mechanization and industrialization of the region. Paul Soyer (1823-1903) had painted all the different activities of a typical nineteenth century foundry in a very frozen way. Table Interior of the Chappée Foundry in Antoigné was bought with the old hosted collection in 1964. Oil on canvas would have been painted between 1880 and 1885. We can find various portraits with in particular a Self -portrait by Julien Chappé painted in 1917. He was himself the son of the director of the famous Chappée factory, painted by Soyer. He made himself donated from the painting to the city. Finally the work of Charles Eugène Morancé 1872-1935, portraitist artist,], represents a Old Manceau worker . This oil on canvas was painted only five years before his death, in 1930.
Mobilier and objects [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
The museum has endeavored to bring together various objects characteristic of the Sarthois furniture of the XIX It is century. This collection is visible in height in the houses on the first on the third floor. The top floor is reserved for the wire worker, kept in perfect condition. This also allows you to admire the frame of the house. The ethnographic reconstruction is not intended to be precise but evocative. Wood craftsmanship occupies an important place explained by the great presence of forests in the Maine region: rocked, Persian, vibraye. Ancient hooves, umbrellas or bushelie and cooperage are thus found. In general, the museum has a lot of furniture in guignier and oak. A creation is typically Sarthoise: Basset , small wardrobe of about 1.20 m from above. In addition to the nineteen-neuvièmist furniture, there is a piece preserved in the Louis XV style to which are supported some boarding-style pieces. In the Maine typical “fire chamber”, there is almost systematic the two -bodies buffet and the famous bass. Finally, the decor is discreet, treated in marquetry or low relief. The “Maine style” is close to the Norman but less exuberant with only a few rosettes, branches or slender garlands decorating the baskets.
Among the items found in the museum, we see particularly: oak mayies at the end of the 18th century It is , two-corps buffets in oak from the same time, two-door two-corplets cupboards created around 1850 but having a composite style Louis XV and Directory.
The modern visit by floors [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
At first floor , is the room of the Spinates. These are medical, religious or civilian objects. Ligron ceramics are also present. Among the ceramics are those of Pierre Innocent Guimonneau, surgeon by his state. On these objects, the inhabitants of his village were represented, in scenes of daily life.
At second floor , there are many photographs and paintings from Le Mans, most often dating from XIX It is century. We can thus admire the Saint-Julien cathedral, or the house of Queen Bérengère, as well as the house of two friends, the house of Scarron, the Saint-Julien fountain or the old halls of Le Mans.
On this floor, a room is devoted to the world of work, and especially predominantly rural, in the fields and factories Sarthoise. As said before, many paintings (oils on canvas) are presented.
At third and last floor , we can discover a rich collection of ears of Ligron’s fact on. Originally, this object was intended to cover the punch with a frame beyond a roof, in order to guarantee its sealing. It is made up of a bulb and a point or of several nestlery elements. In Maine, these ears were in terracotta. Quickly, these objects became decorative, synonymous with power and wealth. They have now completely disappeared today.
When a great photographer meets the work of a humble potter Sarthois
Exploring the provincial museums around 1970 with a certain Jacques Dubois, Robert Doisneau discovered what he called “the little ocher and green tintamarre of the pots of Thuylant (it is Louis Léopold Thuilant (1862-1916), potter to Preceptions) Gentle-style pitchers surrounded by a bas-relief representing the professional gestures and the tools of those for whom they were intended. Thirty pots, thirty citizens of a village at work. The whole radiated friendship. On the handle Sometimes a signature: Thuylant son 1886. Everything contributed to make irresistible the desire to reveal to the ignorant crowds the work of this Rousseau customs of pottery “( In the imperfect of the subjunctive – memories and portraits , Belfond, p. 167); His photos illustrated an article published in “Knowledge of the Arts” in 1973.
Bibliography [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
- Étienne button, The first Queen Bérengère museum in Maine Découvertes n O 51, -January/ .
- FRUER ROBERT, The house known as Queen Bérengère in Le Mans . In: Monumental bulletin, volume 58, year 1893. pp. 4–26 ( Read online )
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