User:Sitesofversailles/sandbox

Summary
This is a list of French gardens and châteaux that were cited in the guidebooks published between 1629 and 1756. The significant concentration of châteaux in the French countryside in the seventeenth and the eighteenth century is linked to French estate-making, the architectural evolution of royal residences, and the growing wealth of the French bourgeoisie, who began spreading into the outskirts of Paris. They later began acquiring, transforming, creating and building châteaux and gardens. This shift to the modern concept of segmented and specialized spaces, like gardens with parterres and orchards, solicited the creation of guidebooks, where touristic itineraries lasted for several days.

The list of the properties is moving over time, and it is interesting to observe the organizing principle of these guidebooks. The guidebooks and sites themselves are both a reflection and an illustration of a system of choices and criteria that were taken into consideration in the selection process. Whether dependent on a fashion or a taste that is evident from a specific guidebook and the list of châteaux, not all of the existing châteaux were listed in the guidebooks. The knowledge related to the guidebooks will help to answer questions, such as which châteaux were more visited in the seventeenth century, or which châteaux were more popular in the eighteenth century and, finally, which château ends up as part of the suggested touristic itinerary. Whenever possible, the list indicates when a garden design was published.

This list includes important estates, such as Versailles or Vaux-le-Vicomte (for the list, see the Additional Resources and Google Fusion Tables: Companion Site below), but it does not include châteaux that are not in the guidebooks, such as:

Additional resources
Google Fusion Tables: Companion Site - https://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?docid=1qO8yIP3V4I1H3QNskdjGaQbnZCHgW_77UAtABRUR

Google Fusion Tables: Generated Map - https://www.google.com/fusiontables/embedviz?q=select+col2+from+1qO8yIP3V4I1H3QNskdjGaQbnZCHgW_77UAtABRUR&viz=MAP&h=false&lat=48.35342201508655&lng=2.543613559661935&t=1&z=8&l=col2&y=2&tmplt=2&hml=GEOCODABLE