#sans-souci

[thefugitivesaint]

Firelei Báez, 'Sans-Souci', (This threshold between a dematerialized and a historicized body), 2015 Source (and here)

[fredericbrumby]

[historybizarre]

Why Did Bridgerton Erase Haiti?

Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton novels are mostly populated with white people like the regency-era England where they take place. The London of Shonda Rhimes’s Bridgerton tv series for Netflix, in contras…

.... I kept thinking how easy it would have been instead to draw upon the many complexities of elite Black life in the nineteenth century—the kind that was at the heart of the Caribbean’s only modern Black kingdom. Created by Henry Christophe, a former general of the Haitian Revolution, Haiti’s first and last king reigned over the northern part of the country for the entire period commonly defined as the regency: 1811 to 1820.

If people want to see Black aristocracy on screen, then why not just put them in nineteenth-century Haiti where they really lived?

On June 2, 1811, Henry Christophe and his wife of 17-years, Marie-Louise Coidavid, as well as their seven-year old son, Prince Victor-Henry, rode into their coronation on a carriage pulled by 8 horses. Their teenage daughters, the royal princesses, Améthyste and Athénaïre, were in a separate carriage pulled by 6 horses. The coronation took place as a mass that was presided over by a white French Catholic priest from Brittany, Father Corneille Brelle, who donned Queen Marie Louise and King Henry with two diamond-studded crowns.

[sexypinkon]

Versailles of the Caribbean:Palace of Sans Souci, Haiti

It is one of the most remarkable attractions in the Western Hemisphere, but the Palace of Sans-Souci in northern Haiti is seldom visited by foreigners.

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Sans-Souci Palace was once the home of King Henri Christophe I of Haiti, a former slave who became a key leader in the 1804 Haitian Revolution, when the small nation gained independence from France.

Haiti was divided in two in 1807, and Christophe became President of the northern half, officially known as the State of Haiti. Seeking a more lofty title, Christophe decided to establish a kingdom in the north, and in 1811 had himself crowned Henry I, King of Haiti. His full title also established him, among other things, as a self-appointed "Destroyer of tyranny, Regenerator and Benefactor of the Haïtian nation."

The new king needed a royal residence, so he ordered the construction of Sans-Souci Palace at Milot, a former French plantation that Christophe had managed during the Revolution. Thousands of slaves completed the building in 1813—Christophe's ruthless national policy of forced labor contributed to the swift construction—and soon became a bustling whirlwind of feasting and dancing, with grandiose gardens, artificial springs, and a system of waterworks.

But Christophe did not enjoy his sumptuous surroundings for long. The public resented him for forcing them to work long hours in the fields, and a stroke on Aug. 15, 1820 left him partially paralyzed. The autocratic king committed suicide 54 days after his stroke by shooting himself with a silver bullet. His son and heir to the throne was assassinated by bayonet 10 days later.

An earthquake in 1842 earthquake destroyed several parts of the palace, but the remaining edifices give a sense of its former grandeur. The building’s checkered history belies its name: sans-souci is French for carefree.

[haitithroughpictures]

Sans-Souci Palace ruins 

[caribbeancivilisation]

Sans-Souci Palace, Haiti

"Henri Christophe, as he was better known, was among the key figures in the Haitian Revolution (1791-1804), which resulted in Haiti becoming the first and only country in the world where slaves won and held onto their independence. A former slave himself, Christophe managed the plantation that was Milot for a time during the Revolution. After the fighting was over and independent Haiti’s first leader, Jean-Jacques Dessalines was assassinated (October 1806), Christophe returned to Milot and created a separate government from that based in Port-au-Prince. Naturally, he was soon elected as the first President of the State of Haiti, as he called it, eventually elevating himself to Henry I, King of Haiti, in 1811.

The Palace, constructed between 1810 and 1813, was known throughout the modern world at the time as The Versailles of the Caribbean. Sprawling gardens, fountains, bronzed lions, artificial springs, opulent furniture, decor and art pieces from all over the world were once literally everywhere the eye could see. The statue below, for instance, was imported from Italy for Henri’s wife, Queen Marie-Louise. There were once 15 of them scattered all about Sans-Souci…

"He wanted to show the rest of the world that the black people they knew only as slaves could achieve grand works the equal of any society."

[a-l-ancien-regime]

Sans-Souci