engraving by P. C. Baquoy after N. A. Monsiau.
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fter the death of Émilie, Voltaire decided to accept a long-standing invitation from Frederick the Great - King of Prussia - to visit him in Berlin. He and Frederick had had a friendship built on a long correspondence but actually being in close proximity with each other turned out to be very hard. Voltaire came to realize that the ruler was more enlightened in theory than in practice. He and Frederick argued constantly and after two years Voltaire left Frederick's court. Reunited with Mme Denis, his niece, he bought an estate in Geneva, which he called Les Delices (currently the home of the Institut Voltaire).But he found the Calvinist nature of the city, and particularly the ban on performing plays too restricting and so in 1758, at the age of 65, Voltaire purchased the estate of Ferney, which he declared to be a "miserable hamlet". He then had built, under his close supervision, the house in which he spent the last years of his life. On the grounds of the estate he built a private theatre in which he could enjoy what was perhaps the greatest pleasure of his whole life - acting in a play of his own, stage-managed by himself. For almost twenty years, Voltaire entertained numerous distinguished guests there. When he took his walk in the garden, carriages lined up to deposit the quality in the courtyards while ordinary people pushed their faces against the iron gates. By 1768, Voltaire was boasting and complaining: "For 14 years now I have been the innkeeper of Europe." Ferney became an obligatory destination for the elite who flocked to it from all over the world. The table below details just some of those who visited, both before and after his death.
| Who | When | Remarks |
|---|---|---|
| Edward Gibon | 1757 and 1763 | Gibbon (the author of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire visited Voltaire at Les Délices in 1757 and spent time in Ferney in July 1763. |
| Jean-François Marmontel | June 1760 | The author of Bélisaire visited Voltaire at Les Délices |
| Giacomo Casanova, Chevalier de Seingalt | 1760 | Casanova's visit to Les Délices is found in Volume VI, Chapter 10 of the Story of My Life |
| The Prince de Ligne | 1763 | |
| James Boswell | December 1764 | Boswell was a visitor at Ferney late in December 1764, and gave a very colorful description of Voltaire. |
| John Morgan and Samuel Powel | September 1764 | John Morgan wrote what is beleived to be the first recorded visit by Americans in The Journal of Dr. John Morgan of Philadelphia from the city of Rome to the City of London. |
| Michel-Paul-Gui de Chabanon | March-November 1767. | The musician gives an account of his six-month stay in Ferney in Tableau de quelques circonstances de ma vie, suivi de ma liaison avec mon frère Maugris. |
| Yekaterina Romanovna Dashkova | May, 1771 | In her Memoirs of the Princess Daschkaw , she describes Voltaire as the "eternal invalid". |
| Le Comte d'Antraigues | 1776 | d'Antraigues is a reluctant visitor to Ferney, but Voltaire's charm quickly wins him over. |
| James Fenimore Cooper | September 1828 | The autor of The Last of the Mohicans writes about his impressions of Ferney in Sketches of Switzerland . |
| Chateaubriand | 1831 | Chateaubriand passed through the area in 1831, and published his reflections in volume IV of the Mémoires d'outre-tombe |
| Alexandre Dumas | 1832 | Dumas describes his visit to Ferney in the chapter, "Lyons to Geneva", of his Travels in Switzerland. |
| E. M. Forster | 1939 | The writer published his reflections of Ferney and Voltaire in Two Cheers for Democracy |
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lthough frail and elderly, nevertheless Voltaire's entrepreneurial spirit allowed him to greatly develop the estate and town and he founded many artisan business such as :Under Voltaire's patronage and uidance, the town grew to employ more than one thousand people and he became known as "The Patriarch of Ferney". He built over a hundred houses for the inhabitants, as well as a school and church, he gave the town interest-free loans, and fed its inhabitants in time of need. After his death, the town was renamed Ferney-Voltaire in his honor.
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