32Buckley, p. 168; Bély, Dictionnaire, p. 825.
33Bowles, p. 44.
34Ibid., p. 53.
35Caylus, p. 42.
36Buckley, p. 195.
37Ibid.; Bély, Dictionnaire, p. 825.
38Bussy-Rabutin, Correspondance, volume V, p. 94.
39Sévigné (1818), volume VI, p. 465.
40Cited in Charlotte Julia von Leyden Blennerhassett, Louis XIV and Madame de Maintenon (London: George Allen & Sons, 1910), p. 68.
41Ibid., pp. 67–8; see also Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 479.
42Cited in Bowles, p. 58.
43Ibid., p. 61.
44Caylus, p. 168; Bowles, p. 61.
45See above, pp. 211–12.
46Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 303.
47Dunlop, p. 267.
48Ibid.; Bluche, Louis XIV, pp. 303–5; Cornette, p. 302; Wilkinson, pp. 169–70.
49Dunlop, p. 267.
TWENTY-ONE: VERSAILLES
1Louis François du Bouchet, marquis de Sourches, Memoires du marquis de Sourches sur le règne de Louis XIV (Paris: Librairie Hachette et Cie, 1882–1893), p. 101.
2Mercure Galant, août, 1682, pp. 15–16.
3Ibid., p. 27.
4Ibid., p. 28.
5The duc de Bourgogne was born on August 6, 1862.
6Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 148.
7Gazette, 1683, p. 396.
8Bowles, p. 66.
9Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, p. 62. The letter is incorrectly dated January 19, 1683.
10Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume II, p. 133. In this letter, dated October 29, 1716, Liselotte spoke of the unhappiness of the queens of France: “We have had few Queens of France who have been entirely happy. Marie de Medicis died in exile. The mother of the King and Monsieur was miserable as long as her husband lived. Our own Queen, Marie-Thérèse, said on her deathbed that in all her life since she became Queen she had had only one really happy day.”
11Bowles, p. 67.
12Wilkinson, p. 232.
13“The populace were so aroused against him,” wrote Liselotte, “that at his funeral they would have liked to have torn his poor corpse into ribbons, and the King’s footguards had to line the road from his house to where they buried him. Even then they couldn’t help innumerable lampoons, in verse as well as prose, being stuck on the walls of the chapel where his tomb is.” (Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott-Stevenson), volume I, p. 64.) Colbert was buried in the Église Saint-Eustache in Paris.
14Murat, p. 417.
15Ibid., p. 420.
16Ibid., p. 422.
17René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, 1643–87.
18Brown, pp. 148–52.
19Le Roi, ed., pp. 159–60.
20Orléans, duchesse d’, Life and Letters, p. 23.
21Caylus, p. 178.
22Choisy, volume 2, p. 93.
23Caylus, pp. 189–90.
24Dyson, pp. 128–9.
25Caylus, pp. 190–1.
26Buckley, p. 242.
27Liselotte, even years later, had been unable to discover whether or not the marriage had taken place (Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume 1, pp. 79–80).
28The council, which met on August 13, two weeks after Marie-Thérèse’s death, agreed that second marriages were “unfortunate” (Fraser, Louis XIV, p. 203; Wolf, p. 332).
29Bély, Dictionnaire, p. 857.
30Fraser, Louis XIV, p. 204. The secrecy surrounding the wedding and the fact that it was not registered means that the date on which it took place is not known. Historians have, nevertheless, offered their own opinions, although their conclusions vary. Blennerhassett (p. 75), for instance, offers January 1684; Bowles (p. 73) and Dyson (p. 128) narrow it down to January 12, 1684. Buckley (p. 246) offers the night of October 9–10 1683, as does Bély (Dictionnaire, p. 857). A letter from Françoise to her spiritual advisor, Abbé Gobelin, dated September 26, 1683, could offer a clue that would support this earlier date. In it, she requests him not to forget her before God, for, she wrote, “I greatly need strength to make a good use of my happiness” (cited in Saint-René Taillandier, p. 130). It might be inferred from this that Françoise had already decided to accept Louis’s proposal of marriage. With no reason to wait, the couple probably married soon afterwards.
31Voltaire, p. 300.
32Cited in Cronin, p. 301.
33Cited in Bowles, p. 78.
34Blennerhassett, p. 75; Françoise d’Aubigné, marquise de Maintenon, Correspondance général, ed. Théophile Lavallée (Paris: Charpentier, 1865), volume 3, pp. 208–9; Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 485; Maintenon (1856), volume 2, p. 198.
35Bowles, pp. 78–9.
36Blennerhassett, p. 76.
37Bowles, p. 78.
38Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 375; Dangeau, volume 1, pp. 88–9.
39Philippe de Courcillon, marquis de Dangeau, Journal du marquis du Dangeau (Paris: Firmin-Didot Frères, 1854), volume 1, p. 87.
40De Imprimerie royale, p. 194.
41Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume II, p. 127.
42Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 349.
43Ibid., p. 351.
44Ibid., p. 352.
45Ibid., p. 354.
46Wilkinson, p. 104.
47Ibid., p. 89, 104.
48Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 351.
49See, for example, Louis’s creation of the Académie Royale de Danse above, p. 109.
50See p. 30.
51Wilkinson, p. 87.
TWENTY-TWO: THE SUN REACHES ITS ZENITH
1Campbell, Louis XIV, p. 64.
2Ibid., p. 65.
3De Imprimerie royale, p. 195. The medal would be struck in 1683.
4Campbell, Louis XIV, p. 65.
5Hassall, Louis XIV, pp. 223–26.
6In 1684, Louis would receive envoys from Algiers, who had been sent to Versailles to beg him for mercy.
7Wilkinson, p. 159.
8Ibid., pp. 159–160.
9Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 300.
10Charles Léopold Nicolas Sixte (1643–1690).
11See above, p. 84.
12Hassall, Louis XIV, p. 226. Sobieski was formerly a client of France, and Louis’s attempts to persuade him not to go to the aid of Vienna had been unsuccessful. The Turks drew back to Budapest, which fell to them in 1685.
13Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, p. 66.
14Gazette, 1684, pp. 668, 692.
15Sévigné (1818), volume VII, p. 260.
16Dangeau, volume 1, pp. 171–2. A personal and public apology from the doge was one of the conditions of Louis’s cease-fire.
17Ibid., p. 174.
18Ibid., p. 176.
19Ibid., pp. 172–3.
20Bernini had worked on the statue between 1671 and 1677. He died in 1680.
21Dangeau, volume 1, p. 252.
22Ibid., p. 134, note.
TWENTY-THREE: THE EDICT OF FONTAINEBLEAU
1Louis, Œuvres, volume I, p. 85.
2Ibid., p. 86.
3Ibid., p. 87.
4Ibid., pp. 87–8.
5Ibid., p. 88.
6France held the view, shared by the rest of Europe, that the ruler decided the religion of the people. Unlike France, however, other countries usually let dissidents emigrate.
7Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 403.
8Ibid., p. 402.
9For this section, Bluche, Louis XIV, pp. 403–5.
10Maintenon (1865), volume 2, p. 162.
11Dangeau, volume 1, p. 233.
12Wilkinson, p. 174; Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 405.
13Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 406.
14Ibid.
15Wilkinson, p. 174.
16Père Bourdaloue was one of the missionaries sent to preach to the newly converted.
17Sévigné (1818), volume VII, p. 353.
18Dangeau, volume 1, p. 332. The school would be disbanded during the Revolution. Napoleon would later establish a military acad
emy, the École Spéciale Militaire, for the training of young officers. It replaced the earlier École Royale Militaire based at Fontainebleau. Napoleon would later move the academy into the premises formerly occupied by Françoise’s school.
19Cited in Bowles, p. 97.
20Saint-René Taillandier, pp. 178–79.
21Dangeau, volume 1, pp. 346–7; Bowles, p. 102.
22Saint-René Taillandier, p. 179.
23Dangeau, volume 1, p. 364.
24Bowles, p. 87.
25Ibid.
26Cited in Bowles, p. 100.
27Along with smallpox, toothache was one of the curses of Louis’s day.
28Le Roi, ed., pp. 135–6.
29Louis had five chief physicians during his lifetime: Jacques Cousinot (1638), François Vaultier (1646), Antoine Vallot (1652), Antoine d’Aquin (1672) and Guy-Crescent Fagon (1693).
30Le Roi, ed., p. 140.
31Ibid., p. 145.
32Ibid., pp. 162–3.
33Burke, p. 33.
34Dangeau, volume 1, p. 291.
35Ibid., p. 296.
36Ibid., pp. 300–1
37Bluche, Louis XIV, p. 467.
38Charles François Tassy, known as Félix, was Louis’s surgeon and premier valet of the garderobe.
39Sourches, p. 457.
40Ibid.
41Ibid.
42Ibid.
43Ibid., pp. 457–8.
44Ibid., p. 458.
45Ibid., p. 461.
46Ibid., p. 463.
47Dangeau, volume 1, p. 426.
48Maintenon (1865), volume 3, p. 49. An instrument of execution, the victim would be tied to the wheel and his limbs broken, after which he was left to die in agony.
49Cited in Dunlop, p. 323.
50Dangeau, volume 1, p. 435.
51Sourches, p. 470. According to the marquise de Créquy, Madame de Brinon, who was noted for her poesy, wrote a prayer for Louis’s recovery and for the souls of those who did not survive Félix’s earlier operations:
Grand Dieu, Sauvez le Roi!
Grand Dieu, Sauvez le Roi.
Venger le Roi!
Que toujours glorieux,
Louis victorieux
Voye ses enemies
toujours soumis.
Grand Dieu! Sauvez le Roi!
Grand Dieu! Sauvez le Roi!
Vive le Roi!
The prayer was then set to music by Lully and sung to Louis when he visited the school upon his recovery. Mme de Créquy notes that the song found its way to England, where the lyrics were translated into English as ‘God Save the King’ and adapted into a patriotic song which became the British national anthem.
The veracity or otherwise of this story cannot be established. It is very late, it is not supported by any contemporary evidence, and the only source for it is the ninth volume of Mme de Créquy’s Souvenirs. Mme de Créquy, a lady of letters, was born in 1714 and married Louis-Marie de Créquy, marquis d’Hemont, in 1737, only to be widowed four years later. Among her friends were Jean-Baptiste le Rond d’Alembert and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. She was not a contemporary witness, and, indeed, there is no reference to the song in the text of the Souvenirs; it appears only in a piece justificative written and signed by three former nuns and dignitaries of the convent of Saint-Cyr, who recalled hearing the song and the story associated with it while at Saint-Cyr: Anne Thibault de La Noraye, P. de Monstier, and Julienne de Pelagrey. The piece justificative is dated September 22, 1819 (Renée Caroline de Froulay, marquise de Créquy, Souvenirs de 1710 à 1803 (Paris: Garnier Frères, 1873), pp. 157–9. The song appears on p. 158. For background information on Mme de Créquy see http://data.bnf.fr/11986767/renee_caroline_de_froulay_crequy/#documents-about).
TWENTY-FOUR: THE LEAGUE OF AUGSBURG
1Hassall, Louis XIV, pp. 228–9.
2Dunlop, p. 306.
3Ibid., pp. 306–7.
4Cologne was an ecclesiastical principality within the Holy Roman Empire.
5Mary of Modena was the daughter of Laure Martinozzi, the eldest of Mazarin’s nieces. Louis had endorsed her marriage to James, who was then duke of York, in 1673.
6William of Orange’s claim came through his mother, who was the eldest daughter of Charles I of England. He also had a claim in right of his wife, who was the eldest daughter of James II by his first wife, Anne Hyde.
7Dunlop, p. 308.
8David Ogg, Louis XIV (London, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 1967), pp. 79–80.
9Dunlop, p. 309.
10Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, pp. 81–2.
11Ibid., p. 82.
12Ibid., pp. 82–3.
13Ibid., p. 83.
14Ibid., p. 83.
15Ibid., pp. 83–4.
16Ibid., p. 86.
17Somerset, p. 211.
18Sourches, volume III, pp. 39–40; Somerset, p. 211.
19Somerset, p. 211.
20Fraser, Louis XIV, p. 231.
21Ibid., p. 231.
22John Miller, James II (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2000), p. 194.
23Miller, p. 208.
24Ogg, p. 81; Campbell, Louis XIV, p. 66.
25Ogg, p. 81.
26Hassall, Louis XIV p. 274.
27Mary F. Sandars, Lauzun: Courtier and Adventurer: The Life of a Friend of Louis XIV (New York: Brentano’s, 1909), volume 1, pp. 36–7.
28Ibid., volume 2, pp. 468–77.
29Bishop Burnet, History of His Own Time (London: printed for A. Miller, 1753), volume III, p. 69.
30Dangeau, volume 3, p. 300; Hilton, p. 327; Bély, Dictionnaire, p. 946.
31Dangeau, volume 1, pp. 302, 320.
32Louis XIV, Œuvres, volume IV, pp. 344–5.
33Namur would be the last siege that Louis would direct personally.
34Diana De Marly, Louis XIV & Versailles (London: B.T. Batsford Ltd., 1987), p. 88; Voltaire, p. 155.
35Dangeau, volume 3, p. 450. According to Liselotte, a servant “has already been arrested under suspicion of having poisoned a silver mug from which Monsieur de Louvois drank during the afternoon.” A month later, she confided to a friend that she did not believe that Louvois’s sons had poisoned him, “bad though they may be. I prefer to think that it was done by some doctor who did the deed in order to please a certain old woman.” The “old woman” was Mme de Maintenon. Several weeks later, she had lost interest: “Monsieur de Louvois is now so completely forgotten that no one bothers to find out whether he was poisoned or not.” (Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, pp. 101, 102).
36Saint-Simon (Wormeley), volume I, pp. 58, 58. Louis had taken advantage of Mademoiselle’s abiding love for Lauzun, who had been languishing in Pignerol. He had prevailed upon her to make over some of her most valuable properties to the duc du Maine. The young duc, therefore, acquired the magnificent châteaux of Eu, Aumale, and Dombes, and in return Lauzun acquired his freedom. Lauzun and Mademoiselle, who were believed by some to have married, later quarrelled, and she refused to have anything more to do with him. She died without ever seeing him again.
37Le Roi, ed., p. 205.
38Maintenon (1856), pp. 303–4.
39For this section, see Voltaire, pp. 441–47; Bluche, Louis XIV, pp. 508–11; Saint-René Taillandier, p. 202–4.
40Cited in Saint-René Taillandier, p. 204.
41Ibid.
42See Brown, p. 215.
TWENTY-FIVE: “SIRE, MARLY!”
1Palace of Versailles (http://en.chateauversailles.fr/discover/history/louis-xiv-guide-gardens-versailles). See also Bluche, Louis XIV, pp. 366–69;Gérard Sabatier, Versailles, ou la disgrâce d’Apollon (Rennes, France: Presses Universitaires de Rennes; Centre de Recherche du Château de Versailles, 2016), pp. 247–57. The fountains had to be turned on and off as Louis and his guests moved through the gardens until the Machine de Marly brought water from the Seine. Although some of the features Louis highlighted in his guide have since disappeared, it is still possible to fol
low in his footsteps and see many of the views he and his visitors used to enjoy.
2Another of Louis’s sons by Athénaïs, the comte de Toulouse, did not marry in his father’s lifetime.
3Barker, p. 217.
4This section follows Saint-Simon (Wormeley), volume I, pp. 144–48.
5Cited in Bowles, p. 167.
6Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, p. 144.
7Saint-Simon notes that the clothes he and his wife bought for the occasion cost 20 thousand livres between them.
8This incident is recounted in Norton, Saint-Simon at Versailles, pp. 25–29.
9François de Neufville, duc de Villeroy, 1644–1730.
10Charles-Henri de Lorraine, prince de Vaudémont, 1649–1723.
11Nicolas Auguste de la Baume, marquis de Montrevel, 1645–1716.
12François Quintin de la Vienne, a masseur, was one of Louis’s four chief valets.
13Campbell, Louis XIV, p. 67.
14Ibid., p. 68.
15Saint-Simon (Wormeley), volume I, pp. 144–48.
16Cited in Wilkinson, p. 88.
17Palace of Versailles (http://en.chateauversailles.fr/discover/estate/estate-trianon).
18Louis d’Auger, marquis de Cavoye (1640–1716), grand sergeant of the king’s household.
19For Marly, see Saint-Simon (Wormeley), volume III, pp. 307–9; Robert W. Berger, “On the Origins of Marly.” Zeitschrift Für Kunstgeschichte 56, no. 4 (1993): 534–44. doi:10.2307/1482675, pp. 534–44; Cronin, pp. 301–4.
20Orléans, duchesse d’, Letters (Scott–Stevenson), volume I, pp. 254, 227, 256.
21duc de Luynes, Mémoires du duc de Luynes sur la Cour de Louis XV (1735–1758). Vol. 2, 1738–1739 (Paris: Firmin Didot Frères, fils et Cie, 1860), volume 2, p. 244.
22Quoted in Cronin, pp. 303–4.
23Berger, p. 537.
24This section follows Saint-Simon (Wormeley), volume I, pp. 224–28.
25Mlle de Séry later became the comtesse d’Argenton. She would have three children by Chartres, although only one, the chevalier d’Orléans, would be legitimized.
TWENTY-SIX: THE SPANISH SUCCESSION
1Campbell, Louis XIV, p. 68.
2Ibid., p. 68.
3Ibid., pp. 68–9.
4Jean-Denis, marquis de Blécourt, d. 1719.
5Dangeau, volume 7, pp. 411, 412.
6Paul, duc de Beauvillier, duc de Saint-Aignon (1649–1714) was first gentleman of the chamber, minister of state, and governor of the royal grandchildren.
7Louis Phélypeaux, comte de Pontchartrain (1643–1727), was contrôleur-général of the finances, secretary of state for the navy and the royal house, and chancellor of France.
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