Antoine de Ratabon

Antoine de Ratabon (1617 – 12 March 1670) was a French aristocrat who served as an arts and architecture administrator during the reign of Louis XIV. He was the first Director of the Académie de Peinture et de Sculpture from 1655 to 1670 as well as the Surintendant des Bâtiments (Superintendent of Buildings) from 1656 to 1664.

Early life and career Ratabon was born in Montpellier, the son of Jean de Ratabon, an equerry, and Catherine Pache from Servien, near Mende. He became Maître d'Hôtel Ordinaire of King Louis XIV, Trésorier Général de France at Montpellier, and Intendant des Gabelles of Languedoc.

In his role as Surintendant des Bâtiments, Ratabon ordered the demolition of the Hôtel du Petit-Bourbon in October 1660 to make way for the eastward expansion of the Louvre and construction of the Louvre Colonnade. The order resulted in the eviction without warning of the troupe of Molière from the theatre of the Petit Bourbon and their transfer to the disused and run-down theatre of the Palais-Royal.

In 1664 Ratabon constructed a house, the Hôtel de Ratabon, to the designs of the architect Pierre Le Muet on a site on the western border of the garden of the Palais-Royal, now 10 rue de Richelieu in the 1st arrondissement of Paris. He died in this house in 1670. It was destroyed in 1873.