Les Invalides

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Les Invalides in Paris, France, is a complex of buildings in the city's 7th arrondissement containing museums and monuments, all relating to the military history of France, as well as a hospital and a retirement home for war veterans, the building's original purpose. The buildings house the Musée de l'Armée, the military museum of the Army of France, the Musée des Plans-Reliefs, and the Musée d'Histoire Contemporaine, as well as the burial site for some of France's war heroes.

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Click here for Les Invalides Plan

How to get there
Access
North Reception desk: by the Esplanade des Invalides
South Reception desk: by the Place Vauban
Metro stops: Line 8, Latour-Maubourg, Invalides Line 13, Saint-François-Xavier, Invalides, Varenne
RER : line C, "Invalides" stop
Bus : 28, 63, 69, 80, 82, 83, 87, 92, 93, Balabus
Parking : esplanade des Invalides
Taxis : boulevard de Latour-Maubourg



Hours and Admission
Opening hours
Open every day of the year, except for the first Monday of every month, and January 1st, May 1st, November 1st and December 25th.
Open from 10:00 to 17:00, from Oct 1st to mar 31st,
and from 10:00 to 18:00, from Apr 1st to Sep 30st.

The Dome Church (Napoleon's tomb) is opened until 6.45 pm in July and in August.

The ticket offices closed 30mn prior to the closing time of the Museum.

Evening openings every tuesday until 9 pm :
reduced admission fee for everybody from 5.30 pm ;
free under 26 years from 5 :30 pm.

Admission

• Full fee : 8 €
• Discount fee: 6 € (students under 26 years old, groups of at least 15 persons over 60 years old, war veterans)
• Free for children under 18 years old.

One single ticket gives access to the Musée de l'Armée, to the Tomb of Napoleon I, to the Historial Charles de Gaulle (closed on Mondays), the Scale-Models Museum and to the Order of the Liberation Museum.

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History
Louis XIV initiated the project by an order dated November 24, 1670, as a home and hospital for aged and unwell soldiers: the name is a shortened form of hôpital des invalides, the hospital for invalids. The architect of Les Invalides was Libéral Bruant. The selected site was suburban in the seventeenth century. By the time the enlarged project was completed in 1676, the river front measured 196 metres and the complex had one hundred and fifty courtyards, the largest being the cour d'honneur ("court of honour") for military parades.

Then it was felt that the veterans required a chapel. Jules Hardouin Mansart assisted the aged Bruant, and the chapel was finished in 1679 to Bruant's designs after the elder architect's death. The chapel is known as Eglise Saint-Louis des Invalides. Daily attendance was required.

Shortly after the veterans' chapel was completed, Louis XIV had Mansart construct a separate private royal chapel, often referred to as the Église du Dôme from its most striking feature (ill. right). Inspired by St. Peter's Basilica in Rome (left) the original for all Baroque domes, it is one of the triumphs of French Baroque architecture. Mansart raises his drum with an attic storey over its main cornice, and employs the paired columns motif in his more complicated rhythmic theme. The general programme is sculptural but tightly integrated, rich but balanced, consistently carried through, capping its vertical thrust firmly with a ribbed and hemispherical dome. The domed chapel is centrally placed to dominate the court of honour. It was finished in 1708.

The interior of the dome (illustration, below right) was painted by Charles Le fredrickLe Brun]]'s disciple Charles de La Fosse (1636 - 1716) with a Baroque illusion of space seen from below (sotto in su perspective, the Italians were calling it). The painting was completed in 1705.

Tombs
The most notable tomb at Les Invalides is that of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821). Napoleon was initially interred on Saint Helena, but King Louis-Philippe arranged for his remains to be brought to St Jerome's Chapel in Paris in 1840. A renovation of Les Invalides took many years, but in 1861 Napoleon was moved to the most prominent location under the dome at Les Invalides.

A popular tourist site today, Les Invalides is also the burial site for some of Napoleon's family, for several military officers who served under him, and other French military heroes such as:

• Henri Gratien, Comte Bertrand (1773 - 1844), army general during the First French Empire who accompanied Napoleon to Elba and then St Helena. He brought Napoleon's body back to France in 1840.
• Joseph Bonaparte (1768 - 1844), Napoleon's elder brother.
• Jérôme Bonaparte (1784 - 1860), Napoleon's youngest brother.
• Napoleon II (1811 - 1832) son of Napoleon.
• Thomas Bugeaud (1784 - 1849), Marshal of France and conqueror of Algeria.
• François Canrobert (1809 - 1895), Marshal of France.
• Geraud Duroc (1774 - 1813), general who fought with Napoleon.
• Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle (1760 - 1836), army captain, author of France's national anthem, La Marseillaise.
• Ferdinand Foch (1851 - 1929), Marshal of France, Allied Supreme Commander in the First World War.
• Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne (1611 - 1675), better known as Turenne, Marshal General of France under Louis XIV and one of France's greatest military leaders.
• Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban's heart (1633 - 1707), designer of Louis XIV's military fortifications.
• Pierre Auguste Roques (1856 - 1920), founder of the French Air Force and Minister of War in 1916.
• Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque (1902 - 1947), Marshal of France, hero of World War II, commander of the famous 2nd Armored Division.
• Jean de Lattre de Tassigny (1889 - 1952), Marshal of France, commander of the French First Army during World War II.