"How the mighty have fallen"

The Bay of Biscay windstorm that crossed France this past week took down a 223-year-old beech tree planted in 1786 to honor Marie Antoinette.

VERSAILLES, France - It survived the French Revolution and a devastating 1999 storm, but high winds have finally toppled a towering beech tree planted for Marie Antoinette more than two centuries ago at Versailles Palace.

The 82-foot (25-meter) high purple beech, one of the last trees in a hamlet dedicated to the former queen in the vast palace park, was felled Friday by an unusually fierce winter gust.

The 223-year-old tree's collapse, which also exhumed a jumble of roots, earth and grass, was the latest blow to the ex-queen's Versailles vegetation after her most cherished oak tree died in a 2003 heat wave.

LINK, Via: Neatorama