The Kill - Emile Zola [167]
aiguillettes de canard sauvage: filets of wild duck breast.
Hôtel de Ville to Luxembourg: The Hôtel de Ville was the city hall of Paris, which dated from the Renaissance; the Luxembourg Gardens were once the park of the seventeenth-century Luxembourg Palace.
Alicante and Tokay: sweet after-dinner wines.
tabouret: a circular seat or stool without arms or back.
Messalina: third wife of the Roman emperor Claudius, known for her licentiousness and her instigation of fatal court intrigues.
CHAPTER 2
Second of December: date of the coup d’etat that transformed Louis Napoleon Bonaparte into Emperor Napoleon III in 1851.
voices from Macbeth: in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the three witches who prophesy that Macbeth will be king, thus setting in motion his murderous theft of the throne.
Faubourg Saint-Honoré: a wealthy and aristocratic quarter of Paris.
Corps Législatif: the national legislature of France.
Prince-President: Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, nephew of Napoleon I, returned from exile in 1848 to garner support for the Bonapartist cause and was elected president of the Second Republic; this event was the prelude to the proclamation of the Second Empire.
guipure and Valenciennes: Guipure is a heavy decorative lace with a large pattern; Valenciennes is a fine lace spun from a bobbin.
Bourse: the French stock exchange.
Crimea: The Crimean War began in 1853, when Turkey declared war on Russia over disputed lands on the Russo-Turkish border; Britain and France were later drawn into the war as allies of Turkey.
tisane: infusion of dried herbs drunk as a beverage or for its medicinal effects.
the Marais: residential area west of the Bastille that was the site of many grand seventeenth-century houses.
Etienne Marcel: As “provost of merchants” in Paris, Etienne Marcel (c. 1315–1358) was one of the leaders of the bourgeoisie in the Estates General of 1355 and 1356.
sca fold: in the Reign of Terror (1793–94), when many were guillotined as enemies of the Revolution.
the Nivernais: region of central France southwest of Burgundy.
the Code: the civil laws known as the Napoleonic Code, which were enacted in 1814 and which governed marriage and property rights.
the Sologne: region of north-central France between the Loire and Cher rivers.
Buttes Montmartre: hill on the northern edge of Paris, known for its cafés and cabarets.
the Madeleine: the Church of St. Madeleine, built in 1806 in the style of a Roman temple.
A Thousand and One Nights: the far-fetched and exotic Arabic tales collected in 1450, also called The Arabian Nights.
Les Halles: the central marketplace of Paris.
Prefect of the Seine: the senior administrator of the département de la Seine, which includes the city of Paris.
Louis XVIII, Charles X, and Louis-Philippe: successive kings of France from 1814 to 1848.
place Royale: A monument of early modern urbanism, the place Royale, constructed during the reign of Henri IV, is today the place des Vosges.
Ile de la Cité: island in the Seine linked to the rest of the city by bridges.
Halle aux Vins: the wine market of Paris.
Jardin des Plantes: vast botanical garden in Paris.
La Salpêtrière: a Paris hospital.
CHAPTER 3
Beau Brummel: English dandy (1778–1840) who was a leader of fashion in the early nineteenth century.
tilbury: a light two-wheeled carriage.
Sibyl on her tripod: prophetess of Greek mythology, who made cryptic pronouncements as the voice of an oracle.
Psyche’s dreamy butterfly: In Greek mythology, Psyche (or the Soul), the lover of Cupid, was sometimes represented as a butterfly.
Saint-Ouen: a northern suburb of Paris, bounded on the northwest by the Seine, where a quarry was located.
Chaillot: an area of high ground on the Right Bank of the Seine.
Trocadéro: the neighborhood of the Trocadéro Palace.
Champenois: characteristic of the Champagne region of France.
Mabille: a park in