Arms on Place d’Armes seminary raise eyebrows
The heraldic motif on the archway entrance to the old St‑Sulpice seminary next to Notre‑Dame has been repainted, and people who care about these things are not happy. The background red is fluorescently vivid, the lions are golden rather than silvery, and the overall effect is garish; the official line of the Sulpicians is that nothing but a little maintenance work has been done. Article includes before and after photos.
jeather 21:41 on 2024-09-17 Permalink
They’re not incorrect about the silver lion being repainted gold and the weird movement of the scrollwork now under the lions, but it does seem like the old one is mostly a dirty version of the new colours, and people dislike it in the mistaken theory that the past was colourless and when it had colours they were all sepia toned. They’re just eroded and dirty!
Kate 09:15 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
True, but they could have chosen a less intense red (going by the photo – I haven’t been down to look at it yet.)
Chris 09:20 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
The intense red is nice. And anyway, it’ll be less intense in a couple of years.
Kate 11:45 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
Older red paints have always faded because the pigments were iron compounds prone to break down over time from sunlight. The colour shown on the archway now is probably cadmium red, which won’t be so graceful.
I looked up the logo of the Sulpician order. While the monogram on the arch is basically the same as shown on the website, the official logo doesn’t have any rampant lions. Religious orders rarely sport heraldic supporters, so I wonder how the lions came to be added to the seminary portal.
jeather 12:18 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
Good news is that smog and various particulates will mute the red anyhow.
CE 14:13 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
I was just at Place d’armes and if I hadn’t read about the new paint job, I would never have noticed (and I spend a lot of time in the area).
CE 15:10 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
Just passed by again and took a closer look. I had never noticed that the two lions are pretty, um, well endowed.
Ian 17:45 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
It’s a metaphor for how they screwed over the natives on the land deal they worked out.
carswell 18:05 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
“I wonder how the lions came to be added to the seminary portal.”
Doesn’t this paragraph from the article answer your question, Kate: “Le fronton original, rappelle-t-il, avait été trafiqué au XIXe siècle afin de plaire au régime britannique. Cet élément architectural du Vieux-Montréal, il le considère comme aussi important « que la colonne Nelson financée majoritairement par les Sulpiciens, dans le même but ».”?
The lions look almost lifted from the coat of arms or the royal standard of the United Kingdom.
Have always found the fronton to be garish and slapped-on. This redo makes it worse.
Kate 18:39 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
You’re right, carswell. Plaire au régime britannique!
It’s bizarre that the Sulpicians financed the Nelson column to schmooze the British. Those invaders, those Protestants, those blokes!
Ian 21:50 on 2024-09-18 Permalink
The Sulpicians weren’t as silly as that, they knew that at its core their strength was in their holdings, which meant sucking up to power and taking advantage of the weak. Since the Sulpicians start granting land in the seigneurie to white colonists in 1787 (betraying the Mohawks) it was pretty clear that they were on the side of power first and foremost.