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Summary
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Da Vinci Code, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Conspiracies and Secrets
Art and Symbolism
Faith vs. Knowledge
Sacred Femininity and Revisionist History
Power and Manipulation
Summary
Analysis
After hours at the Louvre in Paris, curator Jacques Saunière triggers the museum’s security system. Iron gates descend, trapping him in the Grand Gallery. But Saunière’s albino attacker (Silas) threatens to shoot him through the bars unless he reveals the location of some allegedly stolen object. Shocked the man knows this secret, Saunière tells a lie he has rehearsed many times. His attacker confirms that “the others” told him the same thing. Realizing his fellow secret-keepers (called sénéchaux) have been killed, Saunière knows the secret will die with him. The man shoots Saunière in the stomach and leaves him to bleed out. Knowing he must pass on the knowledge entrusted to him, Saunière surveys the gallery’s paintings and gets to work.
Paris’s Louvre Museum is one of the most famous museums in the entire world, housing numerous priceless artworks. That Saunière activates the security system usually triggered by potential thieves exhibits how desperate he is for help. Additionally, he and the other secret-keepers seem to have been prepared for such an attack (given how they practiced the lie), implying their secret is extremely valuable. Saunière’s resolution to find some way to pass on this secret using his surroundings suggests it is in some way related to art.
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Themes
