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Spring 2024

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New in Hyperallergic
A Review of 1668: The Year of the Animal in France

In a review of Peter Sahlins’ 1668: The Year of the Animal in France, Allison Meier of Hyperallergic writes about the animal menagerie of Versailles and how it changed 17th-Century art. Click here to learn more about the book. Click here to read the full review. An excerpt appears below.

“In late 17th-century France, animals were everywhere. And not just local fauna; exotic birds, lions, and even chameleons appeared in art, literature, and philosophical thought. What sparked this bestial enthusiasm? In 1668: The Year of the Animal in France, recently released by Zone Books, Peter Sahlins examines the disruptive influence of the new menagerie at Versailles, alongside other events like the pioneering blood transfusion experiments by Jean Denis, who transferred the blood of lambs into humans (and was charged with murder for a patient’s death). There’s also the writer Madeleine de Scudéry, who was fascinated with her two pet chameleons, describing what she called “the most beautiful animal in the world” in a detailed narrative of their lives and deaths.

“In and around 1668, in Louis XIV’s newly planted gardens of Versailles, in the Royal Library in Paris, in the city’s literary salons, and in print and visual culture, animals made a dramatic entrance onto the stage of French history,” writes Sahlins, a professor of history at the University of California, Berkeley. He notes that animals had of course not been absent from society — horses pulled carriages; Renaissance royalty keeping pet bears — but the perception of animals in 1668 was strikingly different.”