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proper palace chapel was vital to Louis XIII’s desired image. The kings of France ruled by
divine right, meaning that they received their authority not from any earthly source, but directly
from God. The presence of a prominent chapel at the seat of the ruler’s government functioned
as a reminder of this source of power and the king’s independence from any temporal force.
Following his announcement that the building would serve as the chapel of the Louvre,
Louis XIII provided the Oratoire de France with additional titles and gifts befitting its royal
status. The king declared that the Oratorian preachers would serve as chapelains ordinaires to
himself and all future kings, a role and title that gave the priests all the privileges accorded to the
domestics of the maison du roi. 42 In 1627 he awarded the congregation ten thousand livres
from the royal treasury to assist with construction of the church, a sum that Louis XIII intended
to be renewed every year until completion of the building but which due to a shortage of funds in
the royal coffers was only given up to 1634. 43
Appropriating the building, however, and drawing it into the context of the Louvre was
only the first step. In addition Louis sought to affirm visually his connection with the building
and the Oratorians through the imposition on the structure of potent royal symbols. The
architecturally significant apsidal end of the church was one element of this program, a feature
made even more important considering it is the part of the building directed towards the Louvre
(fig. 14). When the king and court approached the church from the palace, most likely along the
rue du Louvre (today the rue de l’Oratoire), they would have first seen the projecting oval chapel
with two prominent stair towers rising up behind it to frame the roof of the apse. The towers,
the building’s most striking exterior feature, provided the church with two important signs
associated with the French monarchy, twin towers and the fleur-de-lis.
Towers had long played a practical role in ecclesiastical architecture, housing the bells
that sounded the hours of the day and providing stairways that allowed access to the upper areas
of the building. 44 Beginning in the Romanesque period, the functional necessities of the form
made towers a common feature, and they remained present throughout the seventeenth century,
with designs planned for notable churches such as Saint-Sulpice (1646-1775) in Paris and
Sant’Agnese in the Piazza Navona (1653-1667) in Rome. 45 The twin towers at the church of the
Oratory certainly fulfilled the practical purpose of providing access to the galleries and the roof,
but their placement at the juncture of the apse and the rotunda is unusual. The feature is most
commonly associated with the front of buildings, where the towers’ placement on the primary
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