Salle du Manège

On 9 November 1789 the National Assembly, formerly the Estates-General of 1789, moved its deliberations from Versailles to the Tuileries in pursuit of Louis XVI of France and installed itself in the Salle du Manège on the palace grounds.

Having nationalised the goods of the Church, the Assemblée nationale, requiring more space than the Manège alone could provide, extended its occupation to two adjacent convents, those of the Capuchins, which soon housed the Revolutionary printing presses in its former refectory, and of the Feuillants, whose handsome library received the archives of the Assemblée.

The proportions of the Salle du Manège, ten times as long as it was wide, offered poor acoustics for the debates that went on continually under its high vaults.

Six tiers of banquettes permitted space for the deputies, ranged on either side of the central tribune, initially planned for the orators' podium.

The Plain sat in the lowest rank of banquettes, from which they were wont to cross to the opposite side, as their opinions dictated.