Palace of Versailles almost all of his courtiers. After the death of Maria Theresa of Spain in 1683, Louis XIV undertook the enlargement and remodeling of the royal apartments in the original part of the palace, within the former hunting lodge built by his father. He instructed Mansart to begin the construction of the Royal Chapel of Versailles, which towered over the rest of the palace. Hardouin-Mansart died in 1708 and so the chapel was completed by his assistant Robert de Cotte in 1710. Louis XIV died in 1715, and the young new King, Louis XV, just five years old, and his government
Palace of Versailles stage in June, 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles, formally ending the First World War, was signed in the Hall of Mirrors. Between 1925 and 1928, the American philanthropist and multi-millionaire John D. Rockefeller gave $2,166,000, the equivalent of about thirty million dollars today, to restore and refurnish the palace. More work took place after World War II, with the restoration of the Royal Opera of Versailles. The theater was reopened in 1957, in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II of Britain. In 1978, parts of the Palace were heavily damaged in a bombing committed by Breton terrorists. The restoration