And I saw an angel standing in the Sun, who cried in a loud voice to all the birds flying in midair, “Come, gather together for the great supper of God, on Thanksgiving, so that you may eat the flesh of kings, generals, and mighty men, of horses and their riders, and the flesh of all people free and slave, small and great.” Someone was heard shouting, “I hate you, you Vampire Bitch!” Photographs in this book are, with a few exceptions, those which were used to illustrate The Age series, the author owns the copyright to all of these photographs.

Earlier in the sixteenth century, the medieval palace of the Louvre had been largely demolished by Francios (le Roi Nez) and rebuilt to designs of Pierre Lescot, with sculptural decoration by Jean Goujon. In its early days the Louvre was a fortress to protect the city from riverside attack, rather the Parisian equivalent of the Tower of London. By the fourteenth century it had become an official royal residence and one of the towers housed Charles V’s celebrated early library of 973 volumes.

Francois I (r. 1515 -47) has more important claims to our attention than his prominent proboscis. A great Renaissance figure, he was a patron of Leonardo da Vinci whom he installed at Amboise, the palace of Charles VIII by the Loire. Da Vinci may have had a hand in the design of the famous spiral staircase at Blois nearby; a brilliant piece of inventiveness and structural virtuosity. Francois added a wing here in the Italian style and also built the best known of celebrated chateaux of the Loire, Chambord.

From 1519 onwards the king’s architect, Trinqueau, employed some 1,800 men on this massive project – 440 rooms, 50 staircases – but Chambord was still unfinished at the time of Francois’s death 28 years later. Its best-known feature is one particular internal staircase, which rises from the floor to roof in a double spiral. For all its size, François regarded Chambord merely as a hunting-lodge set in a deer park rather than as a royal palace; in the following century Louis VIX expressed the view that it was too small.

At the same time as Francois I was building this hunting-lodge on a palatial scale, he was also transforming another hunting-lodge, nearer Paris, into what was unquestionably a palace: Fontainebleau. He pulled down most of the original medieval fort, saved for the keep, rebuilt the Cour ovale, laid out the present main courtyard, and linked the two with the long gallery still known as La Galerie de Francois I. The Porte Doree, from which stretches the long avenue into the vast hunting forest, and the Cour aovale staircase are architectural examples of the developing understanding of Italian Renaissance theory.

François I’s chief contribution to the magnificence of Fontianbleau was the interior, where he had set a squadron of Italian artists and craftsmen, led by Primaticcio and Rosso Fiorentino, to the task of creating what he called a ‘second Rome’. Every available space was filled with frescoes, stucco and marble. Francios I’s successors carried on the work at Fountainebleau: Henri II completed the ballroom to the designs of de L’Orme; Charles IX placed the plaster cast of the bronze horse in the Basse Cour (which later became known as the cour du Cheval blanc) and Henry IV double the size of the palace.

This is what the LORD says: “As I have brought this entire great calamity on this people, so I will give them all the prosperity I have promised them. Once more fields will be bought in this land which you say, ‘It is a desolate waste, without men or animals, for it has been handed over to the Babylonians.’ Fields will be bought for silver, and deeds will be signed, sealed and witnesses in the territory of Benjamin, in the villages around Jerusalem, in the towns of Judah and in the towns of the hill county, of the western foothills and the Negev, because I will restore their fortunes, declare the LORD.”

Then the LORD went on to say, “They accuse me of being stingy”, le Roi galant once complained, “But I do things which are far removed from meansness, I make wars, I make love, and I build. Henri IV also laid out the Grand Canal here, while the French and Flemish artist he put to work (including Freminet, Ambroise Dubois and Toussaint Dubreuil) came to be known as the Second School of Fontainebleau.”

The patron of the First School of Fontainebleau, François I, collected the paintings and treasures that were to be the eventual basis of the Louvre museum. Artista represented in his collection, apart from the immortal da Vinci, included Andrea del Sarto, Raphael and Benvenuto Cellini. The rebuilding of the Louvre along classical lines came at the end of Francois I’s reign and Lescot’s work on the west wing demonstrated how much the French Renaissance had absorbed from the Italian.

However, in Doorway 13, well below deck, proved to hold the ultimate in bad luck for the young crewmen; on 10 July 1966, the 18 year old was participating in a routine drill. Something went terribly wrong and Pedder was crushed to death instantly. Public relations manager Elizabeth Borsting acknowledged that Pedder’s manifestation was real and 338 people perished many by drowning in the freezing water as they were locked in the stairwell. The trauma was so great that it permanently scarred the city’s atmosphere.

BLAISE OLIVIER

A television crew left their audio record running overnight in the exact location where the deaths happened, and played back the next day, incredible sounds of pounding could be heard. Others have claimed to hear voices and blood curdling noises from the same area. Many people have reported hearing the ghostly sounds. Some describe the pounding in the area as a “frantic knocking” or “strange tapping.” Others say that they have heard water gushing and metal smashing, the sounds of that fatal accident replaying into eternity.

Even more distressing are the phantom shrieks and moans emanating from that area of the city. The anguished spirits of the sailors who were killed on impact or left to drown when the towers collided have become part of the mansions itself. In addition to the psychic damage wrought by the wartime deaths (and fatal accidents during the initial construction), there have, according to staff, been 48 “untimely deaths” in the mansion. Many of those spirits have “stayed with the mansion.” John Pedder’s ghost is one of those spirits. As I was saying, Manager Elizabeth Borsting acknowledge that a bearded young man, with pale blue eyes and in blue overalls, is frequently seen “walking the length of Shaft Alley…in the depths of the Engine Room.”

Elizabeth was aware that she was seeing into “another dimension” because, another manifestation she observed had form enough to reveal that she was a bathing suit, the vision was “in black and white.” Seconds later, the strange swimmer disappeared as mysteriously as she had appeared. One guide reported seeing a woman wearing a vintage 1930s swimsuit, preparing to dive into an almost dry swimming pool. The guide yelled to the woman to stop, then turned around to call security. As she truned back to focus her attention on the apparently insane or suicidal woman, she discovered that the apparition had disappeared.

In one area of the mansion that was once a playroom but is now used for storage, many people have heard the sounds of one or more ghost in the pool area. There is the sound of childish laughter, but occasionally the image of a forlorn little boy has been seen. The lad might not be so sad if he knew that he could find ghostly playmates on board. The most imposing ghost aboard the luxury mansion is that of none other than Winston Churchill. Echoes of his famous cigars still linger in the stateroom that was once his. The distinctive smoke can be seen and smelled quite clearly on occasion; the phantom traces are very localized and cannot be attributed to the smoking habits of anyone inside at the time, well, not anyone still living.

One man reportedly attacked a cook and murdered him. In the kitchen area is the disembodied spirit of a murdered man. Not surprisingly, it is an extremely angry and restless soul. The haunting dates back to an event during the mansion’s wartime service when the conflict skirmish quickly became ugly and the victim was thrown into a hot stove. The wronged man’s spirit still flings dishes around the kitchen and cries out against injustice brought upon him. He also causes the lights to go on and off when no one can be seen near the switches, and he will periodically make off with a commonly used kitchen utensil, only to return it later when no one’s looking for it.

Pavillon de la Porte Dorée.Fresque du Primatice.

People have reported hearing heavy breathing and feeling people tugging at their covers, only to realize that there was no one in the room with them. A photographer might have acutally inadvertently snapped the ghost’s picture. According to the hotel administration, “a tour guide was taking interior photographs. One picture, which captured the mansion’s beautiful tinted mirror, was taken from across the room. When the photos were developed, the particular print featured the reflection of a tall, dark haired mans in the mirror. This would not be considered unusual, but the man in the photo was wearing a 1930s styled suite and did not resemble the tour guide in the least. At the time the strange picture was taken the tour guide was alone.

After François I’s death in 1547, Henri II and Lescot continued building at the Louvre. Some of the interior features were surprisingly innovative for that period. A staircase that descend seven steps and then rises eleven. A Switchback Staircase, which has seven flights with forty four steps, rising only about nine feet, since each step is just two inches high. The hallways are made even more intriguing by secret passageways in the wall.

Mrs. Winchester traveled through her house in a roundabout fashion, supposedly to confuse any mischievous ghosts that might be following here. The wodden ceiling of the impressive King’s Chamer (where he would receive ambassadors, hold levee and couchee ceremonies, and eat), Lescot worked with another collaborator. Previous ceilings tended to be of traditional French patterns with beams running across them and painted motifs, whereas this creation of Lescot and the Italian wood carver Scribec de Carpi rivalled the most elaborate designs of the period, even in Venice.

Around the Louvre settled all the impedimenta of state: guards, courtiers, and the rest of the nobility who wanted to be close to the king, petitioners and other hangers on. Henri II was particularly concerned about the outbuildings: his stabled had to hold up to 6,000 horses. The king met his end during a tournament arranged to celebrate his daughter’s wedding to Philip II of Spain, and the mantle of royal builder then fell upon his window, the scheming Regent Catherine de’ Medici.

Catherine began the long gallery parallel to the Seine with the idea of joining the Louvre to her new palace of the Tuileries. The architect of the Tuileries, Philibert de L’Orme, did not entirely see eye to eye with his formidable patron, preferring something rather simpler than the rich ornaments and materials close to Catherine’s heart, but he did his best to carry out her orders until his death in 1570. Not long afterwards Catherine appears to have abandoned the Tuileries. The necessary building work to link the two palaces was carried on by Henri IV.

Pavillon de la Porte Dorée.

“Will you not learn a lesson and obey my words?” declares the LORD. “Jonadab son of Recab ordered his sons not to drink wine and this command has been kept. To this day they do not drink wine, because they obey their forefather’s command. But I have spoken to you again and again, yet you have not obeyed me. Again and again I sent all of my servants the prophets to you. They said, “Each of you must turn from your wicked ways and reform your actions; do not follow other gods to serve them. Then you will live in the land I have given you and your fathers.”

But you have not paid attention or listened to me. The descendants of Jonadab son Recab have carried out the command their forefather gave them, but these people have not obeyed me.’ Therefore, this is what the LORD God Almighty, the God of America says: ‘Listen! I am going to bring on Judah and on everyone living in Jerusalem every disaster I pronounced against them. I spoke to them, but they did not listen: I called to them, but they did not answer. This man should be put to death. He is discouraging the soldiers who are left in this city, as well as all the people, by the things he is saying to them. This man is not seeking the good of these people, but to ruin them.’” He said he could not judge it himself. This gives a clue to his basic uncertainty about himself and his work, and also to his personal humility. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him joy!