Chateau d’ Amboise
Leonardo da Vinci was laid to rest in the flamboyant St Hubert’s chapel at the Chateau d’Amboise, a fitting place as it’s here that the French Renaissance began.
When Charles VII returned to France from the Italian military campaigns of the late 15th century, he bought Italian architects and artists back with him to teach the French. He set his workmen to upgrade the Medieval fortress (in which up to 4000 people had lived) of Amboise into a chateau fit for a King. They worked day and night by torchlight. However he never got to see it finished. Inspecting their work one day, he hit his head on the stone lintel of a door. Though he said he was okay, he collapsed and died within hours.
His successor Louis XI continued the renovation but it was Francis I who bought
it to full Renaissance glory. Born in Cognac, he moved to Amboise aged 6 and was educated there, making it his court when he was crowned King in 1515, the year he invited Leonardo da Vinci to France.
Under his direction the Chateau d’Amboise, perched on a hill dominating the town, became a pleasure palace of immense beauty. He kept lions, tigers, leopards and bears in a dry part of the moat. He staged huge, ostentatious parties, with Leonardo da Vinci designing costumes and automatons, including a clockwork lion. It walked and urinated and its body opened up and was filled with lilies. For a play, he recreated the night sky over the stage complete with constell-ations and planets.
In May and July you can have a ball at Amboise - literally, join in the Renaissance dancing, dress up and feel the history
Chateau Royale Amboise, credit: L De Serres