The Church of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine (French: église Sainte-Marie-Madeleine, pronounced[eɡlizsɛ̃tmaʁimadlɛn]), or less formally, La Madeleine ([lamadlɛn]), is a Catholic parish church on Place de la Madeleine in the 8th arrondissement of Paris.[2][3][4] It was planned by Louis XV as the focal point of the new Rue Royal, leading to the new Place Louis XV, the present Place de la Concorde. It was dedicated in 1764 by Louis XV, but work halted due to the French Revolution. Napoleon Bonaparte had it redesigned in the Neoclassical style to become a monument to the glory of his armies. After his downfall in 1814, construction as a church resumed, but it was not completed until 1842. The building is surrounded on all four sides by Corinthian columns. The interior is noted for its frescoes on the domed ceiling, and monumental sculptures by François Rude, Carlo Marochetti and other prominent 19th-century French artists.[5]
The exterior and interior of the church are undergoing a major project of cleaning and restoration, which began in 2020 and is scheduled for completion in 2024.[6][7]
The neighbourhood, then at the edge of Paris, was annexed to the city in 1722. An earlier church of Saint-Marie-Madeleine was built in the 13th century on avenue Malesherbes, but was considered too small for the growing neighbourhood. Louis XV authorised the construction of a new, larger church, with a view along Rue Royale toward the new Place Louis XV, now Place de la Concorde. In 1763 the King laid the first stone for a new church, designed by Pierre Contant d'Ivry and Guillaume-Martin Couture.[8][9][10]
The first design for the new church by Pierre Contant d'Ivry proposed a large dome atop a building in the form of Latin cross, similar to the Les Invalides church designed by Jules Hardouin Mansart. D'Ivry died in 1777 and was replaced by his pupil Guillaume Martin Couture. Couture abandoned the first plan, demolished much of the early work. and went to work on a simpler, more classical design, modelled after an ancient Greek or Roman temple.
Proposed monument to Napoleon's Army and railroad station, then church again
The construction of the new church was abruptly halted in 1789 by the French Revolution, with only the foundations and grand classical portico completed. After the execution of Louis XVI in 1793, his body was transported to the old Church of the Madeleine, which was still standing until 1801. The King's body was thrown onto bed of quicklime at the bottom of a pit and covered by one of earth, the whole being firmly and thoroughly tamped down. Louis XVI's head was placed at his feet. On 21 January 1815 Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette's remains were moved to a new tomb in the Basilica of Saint-Denis.
Under the Revolutionary government, a debate began on the future purpose of the building. Proposals included a library, a public ballroom, and a marketplace. The new building of the National Assembly, in the Palais Bourbon, at the other end of the former Rue Royale, was given a classical colonnade to match the already completed portico of church.[11] The new Emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte, was crowned in 1804 and in 1806 settled the debate. In 1806 he declared that the church would become "A Temple to the Glory of the Grand Army". While on a military campaign in Poland, he personally chose the design of a new architect, Pierre-Alexandre Vignon (fr: Pierre-Alexandre Vignon), over the design that was recommended to him by the Academy of Architecture.[12] The plan of Vignon took the form of a classical temple with Corinthian columns on all four sides.[13] The work began anew, with new foundations but preserving the classical columns that had already been raised.[14]
After the fall of Napoleon in 1814, the new King, Louis XVIII, resumed construction on the unfinished church, which he intended to make an Expiatory chapel for the sins of the Revolution and the execution of Louis XVI. However, this idea was dropped, and the new church was instead dedication to Mary Magdalene, or the Madeleine, a follower of Jesus who witnessed both the Crucifixion and the Resurrection of Christ.[15]
The architect Vignon died in 1828 before completing the project and was replaced by Jacques-Marie Huvé. A new competition was set up in 1828–29 to determine the design for sculptures for the pediment. The design chosen was The Last Judgment, depicting Saint Mary Magdalene kneeling to pray for sinners, by Philippe Joseph Henri Lemaire. The new government of the July Monarchy decided to go ahead with the church, despite financial difficulties. in 1830 they declared that it would be dedicated to national reconciliation. The vaults were finally completed in 1831.[16]
Work on the church was largely completed during the reign of King Louis-Philippe, between 1830 and 1848. in 1837 a proposal was brought forward to convert church into the first railroad station in Paris, but this was abandoned as expensive and impractical. The church was finally inaugurated on 24 July 1842, the day of Saint Mary-Magdalene.[17]
The new church became popular with musicians. The funeral of Chopin at the Church of the Madeleine in Paris was delayed almost two weeks, until 30 October 1849. Chopin had requested that Mozart's Requiem be sung. The Requiem had major parts for female voices, but the Church of the Madeleine had never permitted female singers in its choir. The church finally relented, on condition that the female singers remain behind a black velvet curtain.
During the Paris Commune of 1871, the curé of the church, Abbé Deguerry, was one of those arrested and held hostage by the Commune. He was executed alongside Georges Darboy, the Archbishop of Paris and four other hostages on 24 May, during the Semaine sanglante, as French government troops were bloodily retaking the city and executing Communard defenders.
The design of the church by Vignon was an example of the Neo-Classical style, using the plan of a peripteral Greek temple, with rows of classical columns around all four exterior sides, not just on the facade. Notable examples included the Temple of Olympian Zeus, the largest temple in ancient Athens, located below the Parthenon, and the much smaller Roman Maison Carrée in Nîmes in France one of the best-preserved of all Roman temples (here the columns around the cella are "engaged" or half-embedded in the wall). The Madeleine is one of the rare large neo-classical buildings to imitate the whole external form of an ancient temple, rather than just the portico front. Its fifty-two Corinthian columns, each 20 metres (66 feet) high, surround the building.
The inscription on the frieze over the entrance reads in Latin: D⸱O⸱M⸱SVB⸱INVOC⸱S⸱M⸱MAGDALENAE, that is Deo Optimo Maximo sub invocatione Sanctae Mariae Magdalenae ("To God all-powerful and Very Great, under the invocation of Saint Mary Magdalen.")
The pedimental sculpture of the Last Judgement is by Philippe Joseph Henri Lemaire. Lemaire's sculpture also has a prominent place on the Arc de Triomphe. In the sculpture, Christ is in the centre, presiding over the Last Judgement, flanked by two angels. On the right is the Archangel Michael, with a group of figures representing the Vices, who will be refused entry to heaven. To the left are the Virtues, escorting those admitted to heaven. Mary Magadelen is shown kneeling with those refused entrance to heaven, expressing her repentance.[19]
According to Macrobius who cites Nigidius Figulus and Cicero, Janus and Jana (Diana) are a pair of divinities, worshipped as Apollo or the sun and moon, whence Janus received sacrifices before all the others, because through him is apparent the way of access to the desired deity.[51][52]
A similar solar interpretation has been offered by A. Audin who interprets the god as the issue of a long process of development, starting with the Sumeric cultures, from the two solar pillars located on the eastern side of temples, each of them marking the direction of the rising sun at the dates of the two solstices: the southeastern corresponding to the Winter and the northeastern to the Summer solstice. These two pillars would be at the origin of the theology of the divine twins, one of whom is mortal (related to the NE pillar, nearest the Northern region where the sun does not shine) and the other is immortal (related to the SE pillar and the Southern region where the sun always shines). Later these iconographic models evolved in the Middle East and Egypt into a single column representing two torsos and finally a single body with two heads looking at opposite directions.[53]
Numa, in his regulation of the Roman calendar, called the first month Januarius after Janus, according to tradition considered the highest divinity at the time.
The temple of Janus with closed doors, on a sestertius issued under Nero in 66 AD from the mint at Lugdunum
Numa built the Ianus geminus (also Janus Bifrons, Janus Quirinus or Portae Belli), a passage ritually opened at times of war, and shut again when Roman arms rested.[54] It formed a walled enclosure with gates at each end, situated between the old Roman Forum and that of Julius Caesar, which had been consecrated by Numa Pompilius himself. About the exact location and aspect of the temple there has been much debate among scholars.[55] In wartime the gates of the Janus were opened, and in its interior sacrifices and vaticinia were held, to forecast the outcome of military deeds.[56] The doors were closed only during peacetime, an extremely rare event.[57] The function of the Ianus Geminus was supposed to be a sort of good omen: in time of peace it was said to close the wars within or to keep peace inside;[which?] in times of war it was said to be open to allow the return of the people on duty.[58]
A temple of Janus is said to have been consecrated by the consul Gaius Duilius in 260 BC after the Battle of Mylae in the Forum Holitorium. It contained a statue of the god with the right hand showing the number 300 and the left the number 65—i.e., the length in days of the solar year—and twelve altars, one for each month.[59]
The four-sided structure known as the Arch of Janus in the Forum Transitorium dates from the 1st century of the Christian era: according to common opinion it was built by the Emperor Domitian. However American scholars L. Ross Taylor and L. Adams Holland on the grounds of a passage of Statius[60] maintain that it was an earlier structure (tradition has it the Ianus Quadrifrons was brought to Rome from Falerii[61]) and that Domitian only surrounded it with his new forum.[62] In fact the building of the Forum Transitorium was completed and inaugurated by Nerva in AD 96.
Another way of investigating the complex nature of Janus is by systematically analysing his cultic epithets: religious documents may preserve a notion of a deity's theology more accurately than other literary sources.
The main sources of Janus's cult epithets are the fragments of the Carmen Saliare preserved by Varro in his work De Lingua Latina, a list preserved in a passage of Macrobius's Saturnalia (I 9, 15–16), another in a passage of Johannes Lydus's De Mensibus (IV 1), a list in Cedrenus's Historiarum Compendium (I p. 295 7 Bonn), partly dependent on Lydus's, and one in Servius Honoratus's commentary to the Aeneis (VII 610).[63] Literary works also preserve some of Janus's cult epithets, such as Ovid's long passage of the Fasti devoted to Janus at the beginning of Book I (89–293), Tertullian, Augustine and Arnobius.
As may be expected the opening verses of the Carmen,[64] are devoted to honouring Janus, thence were named versus ianuli.[65] Paul the Deacon[66] mentions the versus ianuli, iovii, iunonii, minervii. Only part of the versus ianuli and two of the iovii are preserved.
The manuscript has:
(paragraph 26): "cozeulodorieso. omia ũo adpatula coemisse./ ian cusianes duonus ceruses. dun; ianusue uet põmelios eum recum";
(paragraph 27): "diuum êpta cante diuum deo supplicante." "ianitos".
Many reconstructions have been proposed:[67] they vary widely in dubious points and are all tentative, nonetheless one can identify with certainty some epithets:
Cozeiuod[68]orieso.[69]Omnia vortitod[70]Patulti; oenus es
The above-mentioned sources give: Ianus Geminus, I. Pater, I. Iunonius, I. Consivius, I. Quirinus, I. Patulcius and Clusivius (Macrobius above I 9, 15): Ι. Κονσίβιον, Ι. Κήνουλον, Ι. Κιβουλλιον, I. Πατρίκιον, I. Κλουσίβιον, I. Ιουνώνιον, I. Κυρινον, I. Πατούλκιον, I. Κλούσιον, I. Κουριάτιον (Lydus above IV 1); I. Κιβούλλιον, I. Κυρινον, I. Κονσαιον, I. Πατρίκιον (Cedrenus Historiarum Compendium I p. 295 7 Bonn); I. Clusiuius, I. Patulcius, I. Iunonius, I. Quirinus (Servius Aen. VII 610).
Even though the lists overlap to a certain extent (five epithets are common to Macrobius's and Lydus's list), the explanations of the epithets differ remarkably. Macrobius's list and explanation are probably based directly on Cornelius Labeo's work, as he cites this author often in his Saturnalia, as when he gives a list of Maia's cult epithets[74] and mentions one of his works, Fasti.[75] In relating Janus' epithets Macrobius states: "We invoke in the sacred rites". Labeo himself, as it is stated in the passage on Maia, read them in the lists of indigitamenta of the libri pontificum. On the other hand, Lydus's authority cannot have consulted these documents precisely because he offers different (and sometimes bizarre) explanations for the common epithets: it seems likely he received a list with no interpretations appended and his interpretations are only his own.[76]
The Moon phase on Wednesday, December 31, 1997 is Waxing Crescent with an illumination of 7.18%. This indicates the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. On Wednesday, December 31, 1997, the Moon is 2.55 days old. This number shows how many days have passed since the last New Moon.
Moon phase details at Wednesday, December 31, 1997
Moon Phase details
Phase
???? Waxing Crescent
Horoscope
♑ Capricorn
Illumination
7.18% Visible
Rise/Set
8:24 AM / 9:59 PM
Moon Age
2.55 Days
Moon Angular
30.81º
Moon Distance
370,378.60 km
Frequently Asked Questions
On Wednesday, December 31, 1997, the Moon is in the Waxing Crescent phase with 7.18% illumination, is 2.55 days old, and located in the Capricorn (♑) constellation. Data from phasesmoon.com.
The Moon's illumination on Wednesday, December 31, 1997 is 7.18%, according to phasesmoon.com.
Assunto anterior
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The Moon phase on Wednesday, December 31, 1997 is Waxing Crescent with an illumination of 7.18%. This indicates the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. On Wednesday, December 31, 1997, the Moon is 2.55 days old. This number shows how many days have passed since the last New Moon.
AVERAGE MOON RISE
