It was commissioned by King Frederick William II of Prussia. I'm unsure about the second bonus point but would it be Peace Gate?
I'll see your tourist attraction and offer up one I visited in France.
For your bonus point can you name the family who were the original custodians.
Hi Pen,
You were spot on earning both bonus points.
Now to your excellent rebus. I believe you visited there in 2019 but I am not quite sure what you meant by original custodians.
The estate that the Tourist attraction is on was first mentioned in writing in the 11th century. The current buiding was built in 1514–1522 on the foundations of an old mill and was later extended to span the river Cher.
In the 13th century, the area belonged to the Marques family. The original building was torched in 1412 to punish the owner, Jean Marques, for an act of sedition. He rebuilt and fortified the mill on the site in the 1430s. Jean Marques' indebted heir Pierre Marques found it necessary to sell.
Thomas Bohier, Chamberlain to King Charles VIII of France, purchased the castle from Pierre Marques in 1513 and demolished most of it (resulting in 2013 being considered the 500th anniversary of the castle: MDXIII–MMXIII), though its 15th-century keep was left standing. Bohier built an entirely new residence between 1515 and 1521.
In 1535 the residence was seized from Bohier's son by King Francis I of France for unpaid debts to the Crown. After Francis' death in 1547, Henry II offered the château as a gift to his mistress, Diane de Poitiers In 1555 she commissioned Philibert de l'Orme to build the arched bridge joining the buiding to its opposite bank. Diane de Poitiers was the unquestioned mistress but ownership remained with the crown until 1555 when years of delicate legal manoeuvres finally yielded possession to her.
After King Henry II died in 1559, his strong-willed widow and regent Catherine de' Medici forced Diane to exchange it for the Château Chaumont. Queen Catherine then made it her own favourite residence, adding a new series of gardens. As Regent of France, Catherine spent a fortune on the building and on spectacular nighttime parties. In 1560, the first-ever fireworks display seen in France took place during the celebrations marking the ascension to the throne of Catherine's son Francis II. The grand gallery, which extended along the existing bridge to cross the entire river, was dedicated in 1577. Catherine also added rooms between the chapel and the library on the east side of the corps de logis, as well as a service wing on the west side of the entry courtyard.
On Catherine's death, in January 1589, the building went to her daughter-in-law, Louise of Lorraine, wife of King Henry III.
Henry IV obtained the property for his mistress Gabrielle d'Estrées by paying the debts of Catherine de' Medici, which had been inherited by Louise and were threatening to ruin her.
The château belonged to the Duke of Vendôme and his descendants for more than a hundred years. The Bourbons had little interest in the château, except for hunting. In 1650, Louis XIV was the last king of the ancien régime to visit.]
The property was bought by the Duke of Bourbon in 1720. Little by little, he sold off all contents. Many of the fine statues ended up at Versailles.
In 1733 the estate was sold for 130,000 livres to a wealthy squire named Claude Dupin His wife, Louise Dupin, was the natural daughter of the financier Samuel Bernard and the actress Manon Dancourt whose mother was also an actress who had joined the Comédie Française in 1684. The widowed Louise Dupin saved the bilding from destruction during the French Revolution, preserving it from being destroyed by the Revolutionaries because "it was essential to travel and commerce, being the only bridge across the river for many miles."
In 1864 Marguerite Pelouze, a rich heiress, acquired the property. Around 1875 she commissioned the architect Félix Roguet to restore it. He almost completely renewed the interior and removed several of Catherine de' Medici's additions, including the rooms between the library and the chapel and her alterations to the north façade, among which were figures of Hercules, Pallas, Apollo, and Cybele that were moved to the park. With the money Marguerite spent on these projects and elaborate parties, her finances were depleted, and the château was seized and sold.
Jose-Emilio Terry, a Cuban millionaire, acquired it from Madame Pelouze in 1891. Terry sold it in 1896 to a family member, Francisco Terry. In 1913, it was acquired by Henri Menier, a member of the Menier family, famous for their chocolates, who still own it to this day.
During World War I Gaston Menier set up the gallery to be used as a hospital ward. During the Second World War, the building was bombed by the Germans in June 1940. It was also a means of escaping from the Nazi-occupied zone on one side of the River Cher to the "free" zone on the opposite bank. Occupied by the Germans, the building was bombed by the Allies on 7 June 1944, when the chapel was hit and its windows destroyed.
In 1951, the Menier family entrusted the château's restoration to Bernard Voisin, who brought the dilapidated structure and the gardens (ravaged in the Cher flood in 1940) back to a reflection of its former glory.
Somewhere in that rag tag description there may be a justification for a bonus point.
