This former home of French kings epitomizes royal elegance in the style of Old Europe. Versailles originated in 1631 as a humble hunting lodge for Louis XIII. But his son Louis XIV built the now familiar palace on the site outside Paris and moved the nation’s government and court to Versailles in 1682.
Versailles remained the epicenter of French royal power, home to government offices and courtiers alike, until 1789—when a hungry and agitated group of mostly female revolutionaries stormed the palace and essentially evicted Louis XVI and his queen, Marie-Antoinette. The mob sent the royal couple back to Paris on the first steps of a journey that led eventually to their beheadings.
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