The grandest Grande Singerie is in the Château de Chantilly, a modest 18th century bungalow about 30 miles from Paris.
Says the Times:
In the early 1700s it was fashionable for aristocrats to keep monkeys as pets. They dressed the monkeys in fancy outfits for comic effect and taught them human tricks, like pickpocketing, that they would display on leisurely walks around Versailles.
“The monkey was like a dog, a domestic animal,” Ms. Garnier-Pelle said.
But why is Huet’s work so compelling today? “Monkeys represent man,” she said. “When we laugh at monkeys, we laugh at ourselves.”
This is the sort of thing that encouraged the French Revolution. Talk about your popular ape species uprisings.
Happy Bastille Day.