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CHAPTER 6
FROM NOTRE-DAME-DES-VICTOIRES TO NOTRE-DAME-DE-PARIS:
THE SHIFTING PRIORITIES OF LOUIS XIII (1629-1638)
Throughout the 1620s Louis XIII supported a number of newly established reformed
religious orders in Paris, contributing to the façade of the church of the Feuillants and providing
aid for the construction of the church of the French Oratorians and Saint-Louis-des-Jésuites. In
1629 the king’s record as a patron of ecclesiastical architecture prompted a community of
Discalced Augustinians to ask the sovereign to be the founder of its monastery and church, a
request to which he agreed. In December of the same year Louis XIII honored the reformed
order by naming its monastery a royal foundation and placing the first stone of its church Notre-
Dame-des-Victoires (fig. 82). Because of the king’s past associations with religious groups and
bolstered by his early show of support, the Augustins Déchaussés anticipated royal funding for
their church, modeling their project after earlier buildings receiving financial contributions from
the monarch. In the end, however, the monks’ attempts were in vain, and they became the last
reformed religious order in Paris to receive any support from the king. Beginning in the early
1630s Louis XIII instead chose to focus royal funds on churches with established connections to
the state, starting with the Sainte-Chapelle and continuing with the chapel of the Sorbonne and
Notre-Dame-de-Paris.
In light of Louis XIII’s active contributions during the 1620s to churches of reformed
religious orders, the king’s abrupt decision to no longer support them during the following
decade must be considered as a significant change. My purpose in this chapter is to demonstrate
that royal neglect of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires stemmed from shifting priorities in the French
government, concerns that moved from worries about internal struggles with conservative
Catholics and rebellious Huguenots to an international focus on the expansion of Habsburg
forces. In the early 1630s as Louis XIII turned his attention to the Sainte-Chapelle, the king no
longer needed to control the reformed religious orders to buttress his claims as leader of the
Gallican church. Alternatively France was becoming increasingly active in the Thirty Years’
War, forcing the king to take action against a growing Spanish threat. I argue that the king, by
choosing to support ecclesiastical buildings with established histories with the French kingdom,
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