Book Lilies and the Republic

This catalogue les lys et la république invites you to relive an exceptional exhibition proposed to the public by the Domaine national de Chambord in 2013. This book takes you to the heart of a little-known subject. In 1871, the National Assembly was a monarchist. A word to the Count of Chambord, the last Bourbon of the elder branch, is enough to ascend the throne. The ceremony is prepared. Is France going to restore a constitutional monarchy? The prince demands the white flag. The French are waiting for the tricolour flag, including in the ranks of the royalists. This is the moment when France definitively chooses the Republic.

In the mirror of the destiny of the "child of the miracle" that Lamartine celebrates in 1820, it is the turbulent history of an indecisive France which, between 1870 and 1875, hesitates on the choice of regime to adopt, the lilies or the Republic? In exile, in palaces in Great Britain, Austria or Italy, the prince lived in the hope of restoration. Curious about discoveries, he travels in Europe and the Middle East to build a project that he will only partially express in a rich correspondence and published manifestos. Absent and yet present thanks to sustained propaganda, the Count de Chambord remains both near and far, and his memory haunts legitimist families long after his death without posterity. In this he embodies "a romanticism of despair" as Emmanuel de Waresquiel wrote in his introduction.