Introduction:
When we speak about the Louvre Today, we think immediately of the Parisian museum which contains a very impressive collection of work of art . But before becoming one of the biggest museums in the world, the Louvre was in the beginning a stronghold which was used as a shelter from enemy attacks. It is at the end of the XIIth century that Philippe August decides to build a feudal castle to defend Paris. This castle will become soon the royal residence. The great kings who followed Philippe August will rebuild and extended the palace so that the present Louvre doesn't resemble of nothing the Louvre of the XIIth century.

The Louvre museum is the biggest in Paris by its surface (160 106 m² of which 58 470 dedicated for the exhibitions). The building is a former royal palace, situated at the centre of the Paris city, between the Seine right strand and the Rivoli Street. It is one of the oldest museums and the third biggest in the world. The Louvre has a long history of artistic and historic conservation of France, since the capetians kings until the Napoleonic Empire.
It shelters one of the most famous pictures in the world, if not the most famous
The Joconde of Leonardo de Vinci.
History of the palace :
The history of France has much marked the Louvre Palace history. At the origin of the Louvre there is a strong castle, the Louvre’s big tower, established by King Philippe August, in 1190. One of his main missions is the Seine downstream surveillance, which constitutes one of the traditional ways of the invasions and raids since the Vikings time