Paris during the Bourbon Restoration

During the Restoration of the Bourbon monarchy (1815–1830) that followed the downfall of Napoleon, Paris was ruled by a royal government which tried to reverse many of the changes made to the city during the French Revolution.

Following the final defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in June 1815, an army of 300,000 soldiers from England, Austria, Russia and Germany occupied Paris, and remained until December 1815.

Members of the Academies and Institute who had supported Napoleon were expelled, including the painter Jacques-Louis David, the mathematicians Lazare Carnot, Gaspard Monge, and the educator Joseph Lakanal.

A more serious incident took place on 13 February 1820; the assassination of the Duke de Berry, the nephew of the King, and the only hope of the dynasty for providing a male heir to the throne.

The government had a brief period of popularity in 1823 when a French military expedition to Spain succeeded in restoring another deposed monarch, Ferdinand VII, to the Spanish throne in Madrid.

[6] The aristocrats who had emigrated returned to their town houses in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, and the cultural life of the city quickly resumed, though on a less extravagant scale.

Most of the new Parisians were immigrants from the nearby French regions, seeking work as the city's economy recovered from the long years of war under Napoleon.

The ancient and decayed Tuileries was not a comfortable residence; it had no basement or sewers, and the lack of modern plumbing made it foul-smelling; one noblewoman, the Countess of Boigne, reported that "one is almost suffocated climbing the staircases of the Pavillon de Flore and crossing the corridors of the second floor."

Unable to become part of the aristocracy, many were elected to the Chamber of Deputies and advocated liberal economic policies and democratic principles, which eventually brought them into growing conflict with the royal government.

The Canal Saint-Martin was finished in 1822, and the building of the Bourse de Paris, or stock market, designed and begun by Alexandre-Théodore Brongniart from 1808 to 1813, was modified and completed by Éloi Labarre in 1826.

[12] The city soon had to enlarge its borders, In 1817, the village of Austerlitz, on the site of the modern train station of that name, was annexed to Paris, bringing with it the hospital of La Saltpétriére.

French scientists made important advances in new technologies, including the manufacture of rubber, aluminum, and gilded products, which were turned into industries.

During the Restoration, inspired by the work of the chemist Jean-Antoine Chaptal and other scientists, new factories were built along the left bank of the Seine, making a wide variety of new chemical products, but also heavily polluting the river.

Their return during the Restoration and especially the rapid growth of the number of wealthy Parisians revived the business in jewelry, furniture, fine clothing, watches and other luxury products.

The height and gloomy aspect of the houses; the narrowness of the streets, and the want of pavement for foot passengers, convey an idea of antiquity, which ill accords with what the imagination had anticipated of the modern capital of the French Empire.

[19] According to the 19th century French historian and academician Maxime du Camp, the "primordial elements" of the Paris diet were bread, meat, and wine.

Bakers were the most strictly regulated of all Paris businessmen; they had to show the police that they had lived a correct and moral life, and to pass a long apprenticeship.

The human waste of the Parisians went into outdoor latrines, usually on the courtyards of the buildings, or cesspools and was carried away at night by laborers called vidangeurs to large dumps created for this purpose at the Buttes des Chaumont and other sites around the edge of the city.

An 1819 guidebook praised the toilets at the Palais-Royal; "Cabinets of an extreme cleanliness, an attractive woman at the counter, doorkeepers full of enthusiasm; everything enchants the senses and the client gives ten or twenty times the amount asked."

[29] For those travelling greater distances, to other cities or the Paris suburbs, several companies ran diligences, large enclosed coaches which could carry six or more passengers.

[31] The early 19th century was the great age of the canal, both as a source of drinking water and as a means of transportation, and the government of the Restoration actively promoted their construction.

In 1821 it was connected by the canal Saint-Denis, 6.5 kilometers long, to the basin at la Villette, which became a major commercial port for barges and boats bringing goods to the city.

The University students, largely the children of the growing Parisian middle class, were much more politically active than previous generations; many vocally advocated a return to a Republic and the abolition of the monarchy.

In the 1780s, Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, badly in need of funds, Created arcades and galleries around the garden, rented them out to small shops and the first luxury restaurants in Paris, and opened the Palais-Royal it to the public.

[41] The café was an important social institution of the period, not as a place to eat but as an establishment to meet friends, drink coffee, read the newspapers, play checkers and discuss politics.

He began the Restoration as a committed defender of the Catholic faith and royalist, but gradually moved into the liberal opposition and became a fervent supporter of freedom of speech.

Dominique Ingres also began his career with a portrait of Napoleon, but achieved great success during the Restoration with his precise and realistic classical style.

In 1830, Eugène Delacroix, the leader of the romantic painters, made his most famous painting, Liberty Leading the People, an allegory of the 1830 Revolution, with Notre Dame and Paris buildings in the background.

On 26 July 1830 the King and his government responded by suspending the freedom of the press, dissolving the new parliament before it had even met, and raising the changing the election laws so only the richest citizens were allowed to vote.

In the absence of royal leadership, and eager to avoid another republic and reign of terror, liberal members of the parliament created a provisional government and made their headquarters at the Hotel de Ville.