Huguenot gentry: The “Huguenots” were France’s Calvinists. This overall term also included a small number of Lutherans.
“spectacularly un-Christian”: Davies, Norman, Europe: A History (Oxford: OUP, 1997), 506.
into the bargain: Henri’s first wife was Marguerite de Valois (1553–1615), also known as la Reine Margot. Exceedingly beautiful and cultured, but also promiscuous and ambitious, she was the last member of the Valois dynasty. Henri divorced her in 1699; they had lived apart for most of their marriage and had no children.
Catholic France: Not all credit for the Edict should be laid at Henri’s feet. Most of its terms had in fact been suggested by his predecessor, Henri III, but had been rejected by Catholic extremists. The Edict did not apply to Jews and Muslims, of whom the latter were expelled from France in 1610.
Catholic King: In England, by contrast, public officials were obliged to swear an Oath of Supremacy to the sovereign as head of both state and Church. In Germany, the principle of cuius regio eius religio (whose region, his religion) permitted each local ruler to choose his confession, and required all his subjects to follow it. As far as most Europeans of the time were concerned, religion was politics. The only other states to possess any form of official religious cohabitation were Transylvania and Poland-Lithuania, the latter then Europe’s largest state. Henri III of France (then duc d’Anjou) had been obliged to accept religious pluralism as a condition of his acceptance of the Polish-Lithuanian throne; he reigned there only from 1573 to 1574.
“my spiritual children”: D’Aubigné, Agrippa, Sa vie à ses enfants, ed. Gilbert Shrenk (Paris: Nizet, 1986), 220 ff. The greatest of d’Aubigné’s works, his Tragiques, is a relation of the conflict provoked by the Paris Saint Bartholomew’s Eve massacre of 1572, in which some 5,000 Huguenots were killed at the hands of Catholic mobs. Les Tragiques, begun in 1577, was completed and first published in 1616.
bitterest enemies: The Habsburg dynasty had been divided into two separate houses, Austrian and Spanish, by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in 1521. By 1610 both were Catholic powers of vast extent. The Austrian Habsburg Empire stretched from Poland to the Czech lands and from Bavaria to Croatia, and the Spanish included Portugal, parts of the present-day Netherlands, Italy, and central Europe, as well as overseas territories in East Asia, Africa, and the Americas. For the Austrian Habsburgs, see Evans, R. J. W., The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1550–1700: An Interpretation (Oxford: OUP, 1984). For the Spanish, see Elliott, J. H., Imperial Spain, 1469–1716 (New York: Mentor, 1966). For the early history of the dynasty, see Wheatcroft, Andrew, The Habsburgs: Embodying Empire (London: Penguin, 1996).
“Indian gold”: See Christopher Marlowe, The Massacre at Paris, Act I, scene ii, ll. 60–61. Marlowe based his play on the events of Saint Bartholomew’s Eve, 1572.
Henri’s death: A truce between the two countries had been signed in 1598 (the Peace of Vervins), but Henri had continued hostilities in a kind of “cold war,” by supporting Spain’s enemies.
Habsburg influence: The sudden loss of French prestige after Henri’s death was most clearly seen, then as now, by the cancelled attack on Spanish-held Milan. See Bertière, Simone, Les Reines de France aux temps des Bourbons: Les deux régentes (Paris: De Fallois, 1996), 80 ff.
prince de Bourbon-Condé: Henri II de Bourbon Condé, duc d’Enghien (1588–1646), father of Louis II, “le Grand Condé.”
livres: One livre at this time was roughly equivalent to one English shilling; twenty livres would therefore be about one pound.
once again repelled: The French Catholic Church had maintained a formal degree of independence from Rome at least since the Bologna Concordat of 1516. In 1616, this was strengthened by France’s refusal to publish the Tridentine dictates, that is, the dictates of the Council of Trent (1545–63), a central feature of the Catholic Counter-Reformation. See the sections on Gallicanism in MacCulloch, Reformation.
“I do not like you”: Quoted in Garrisson, Janine, L’Édit de Nantes et sa révocation (Paris: Seuil, 1985), 59.
death as a traitor: Belatedly, for his support of the Protestant cause against Marie de’ Medici. In his Sa vie à ses enfants (220), Agrippa suggests that Constant agreed to turn Catholic in order to have his gambling debts paid off.
seventeen years: Nathan is believed to have been born in 1601 to a Jacqueline Chayer. Françoise does not appear to have ever met or corresponded with this illegitimate uncle, who later practised medicine in Geneva under the name of Nathan Engibaud, the surname an anagram of d’Aubigné.
Maillezais: Now known as Coulonges-sur-l’Autize.
“Father, forgive them”: Agrippa d’Aubigné’s second wife, whom he married in 1623, was the fifty-five-year-old Italian Renée Burlamacchi, widow of a César Balbani. Segrais nonetheless later described her as “very young” the story of the lesson is taken from Segrais, Jean Regnault de, Segraisiana, ou mélange d’histoire et de littérature (Amsterdam: Compagnie des libraires, 1722), I, 111–12.
the same dagger: Constant’s first wife was Anne Marchand, widow of Jehan Courrault, a minor nobleman. They were married in La Rochelle on September 3, 1608. There were no children from the marriage. Anne’s lover was one Lévesque, son of a Niort lawyer. Both were killed in that town on February 6, 1619.
“furiously writing prose”: D’Aubigné, 223.
Holy Roman Empire: The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation was a loosely linked archipelago of hundreds of principalities and estates, cities, and bishoprics, both Catholic and Protestant. It was by no means exclusively German; territories as far afield as Lombardy had allowed it to claim its “Roman” title, and it had once encompassed even the papal states. For generations, the Holy Roman Emperors had been successively elected from the Catholic Austrian House of Habsburg, but since the beginning of the Reformation, the Empire’s tenuous cohesion had been threatened by growing Protestant objections to the rule of a Catholic Emperor. Of the Empire’s seven Electors, three were Catholic bishops, three Protestant princes, and the seventh was the elected King of Bohemia, in recent decades always Catholic and always a member of the Habsburg family. But following the death of the childless Emperor Matthias, Bohemian Protestants elected Friedrich, the Calvinist Elector of the Palatine, neither Catholic or Habsburg, as their new King, and effectively the new Emperor. The Habsburgs retaliated in what came to be seen as the first battle of the Thirty Years War of 1618–48. See Wedgwood, C. V., The Thirty Years War (London: Pimlico, 1992). France was not yet officially involved in the war.
Cardinal Richelieu: Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu, Cardinal-Duc de Richelieu 1585–1642), prime minister from 1624 until his death, he was effectively the architect of absolutism in France.
La Rochelle Huguenots: In 1625, Buckingham had offered to help Richelieu in his fight against the Huguenots, in return for French help against the Spanish. Nothing came of these negotiations, and in June 1627 Buckingham led an eighty-strong English fleet to aid the Huguenots besieged by Richelieu at La Rochelle; he failed disastrously.
“the treacherous soul”: Quoted in Desprat, Jean-Paul, Madame de Maintenon, ou le prix de la réputation (Paris: Perrin, 2003), 22.
“gentleman landowner”: Pierre de Cardilhac was entitled “Sieur de Lalonne,” that is, gentleman landowner of Lalonne. His wife came from the family Montalembert, of the Essarts family branch. Besides Jeanne, they had several other children, of whom little is known.
Gaston d’Orléans: Gaston Jean Baptiste de France, duc d’Orléans (1608–60). Married, he became the father of the duchesse de Montpensier, la Grande Mademoiselle.
of course, himself: This 1630 rebellion was led by Henri II de Montmorency (1595–1632), who was finally defeated at Castelnaudary in 1632; he was subsequently executed for treason.
nothing at all: Françoise’s godfather was the nephew of the first duc de La Rochefoucauld, former governor of Poitou, and the son of Benjamin, the baron d’Estissac, at this time only a mestre de camp, but later governor of L
a Rochelle. Her godmother’s mother, Madame de Neuillant, was related by marriage to the d’Aubignés through the family Laval-Lezay. Her father was the brother of the comte de Parabère, governor of the province of Poitou from 1633. Godmother Suzanne married in 1651 the future maréchal-duc de Navailles.
near Geneva: The château of Crest, rebuilt by Agrippa d’Aubigné in the early seventeenth century, is still standing and is now a wine domaine.
since died: Marie de Caumont d’Adde (1581–1625).
“ugly, vulgar spendthrift”: The verdict of Caumont d’Adde’s superior, the governor of Maillezais, quoted in Desprat, 20.
years’ income: See Cornette, Joël (ed.), La France de la Monarchie absolue, 1610–1715 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1997), 281 ff.
lands attached: The château de Mursay is still standing, though in a state of near ruin. However, in 2002 it was purchased by a local Niort authority for the modest sum of 12,000 euros. Consolidation and preservation work is now underway at the expense of the French government. The château will not be fully restored but will be maintained as a type of “romantic ruin.”
“little lap desk”: Rapley, Elizabeth, The Dévotes: Women and the Church in Seventeenth-Century France (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1990), 161.
“I love a big fire”: Letter to Mr d’Aubigné, February 10, 1680, in Madame de Maintenon, Lettres, ed. Langlois, Marcel, Vols II–V (Paris: Letouzy et Ané, 1935–59), II, no. 207, 335–41.
“I’m a lady”: D’Aumale, Marie-Jeanne, Souvenirs sur Madame de Maintenon: Mémoire et lettres inédites de Mademoiselle d’Aumale, 2e ed. (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1902), 15.
“You were my father”: Letter from Madame Scarron in Paris to Benjamin de la Villette at Mursay, December 7, 1660, in Langlois (ed.), Lettres II, no. 6, 28.
“painting some good”: Letter from Pierre Sansas de Nesmond to Caumont d’Adde, dated Pentecost 1642, quoted in Correspondance générale de Madame de Maintenon, ed. Lavallée, Théophile, 4 vols (Paris: Charpentier, 1866) I, 1e partie, 15 ff. Subsequent quotations from Nesmond in this paragraph are taken from the same letter.
“The smallest gift”: See the letters from Jeanne d’Aubigné of June 12, 1641, and January 26, 1642, in ibid., nos I and II, 11–15. Despite his lack of enthusiasm for the cause, Benjamin de Villette did visit Jeanne at least once after this, in March 1642, during her battle with Sansas de Nesmond.
“I feel so sorry for him”: Letter of July 14, 1642, in ibid., no. III, 17–18.
“I acknowledge”: Constant’s note of August 14, 1642, quoted in Lavallée, Théophile, La Famille d’Aubigné et l’enfance de Madame de Maintenon (Paris: Henri Plon, 1863), 74.
“for the trouble”: Letter of July 14, 1642, in Lavallée (ed.), Correspondance générale I, 1e partie, no. III, 17–18.
“having abandoned, against all”: From Constant’s requête to the tribunal at Niort, quoted in ibid., 22 ff.
“bit of misbehaviour”: Quoted in ibid., 19.
“cast aside your sisterly passion”: Letter of July 23, 1642, in ibid., no. IV, 20–2.
“one of our Catholic authors”: Letter of July 14, 1642, in ibid., no. III, 18.
“Widows should not”: Ibid.
political amnesties: The duc de La Rochefoucauld suggested that “a sentiment of piety” may also have motivated the King to declare the amnesties. See La Rochefoucauld, Mémoires Paris: La Table Ronde, 1993), 99.
Two: America!
half-brother, Nathan: In June 1643, Constant, then in Lyon, wrote to his half-brother Nathan in Geneva that he was in the direst financial straits and thinking of seeking a provincial retreat in Provence.
“only twice”: D’Aumale, Marie-Jeanne, Souvenirs sur Madame de Maintenon: Mémoire et lettres inédites de Mademoiselle d’Aumale, 2e ed. (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1902), 18.
“My mother brought us up”: Desprat, Jean-Paul, Madame de Maintenon, ou le prix de la réputation (Paris: Perrin, 2003), 262.
the difficulties which his bad behaviour: Letter of July 23, 1642, in Correspondance générale de Madame de Maintenon, ed. Lavallée, Théophile, 4 vols (Paris: Charpentier, 1857), I, 1e partie, no. IV, 19.
“She did not like to talk”: D’Aumale, 15.
in Spanish possession: In 1493, after Columbus’s first voyage, Valencia-born Pope Alexander VI had issued a papal bull according Spain and Portugal (but mostly Spain) sovereign rights over all the New World territories. Surprisingly, the two countries between themselves had subsequently managed to work out a more equitable arrangement, without bloodshed, which was approved in 1506 by Alexander’s successor, Pope Julius II (an Italian).
“Gentlemen’s Association”: L’Association des Seigneurs de la Colonisation des îles de l’Amérique received its letters patent on October 31, 1626.
“in good silver écus”: Quoted in Merle, Louis, L’Étrange beau-père de Louis XIV: Constant d’Aubigné 1585–1647, le père de Madame de Maintenon (Paris: Beauchesne, and Fontenay-le-Comte: Lussaud, 1971), 118. The écu was a coin worth three livres.
“roots or leaves”: Bates, E. S., Touring in 1600 (London: Century, 1987), 78.
“Some of the engagés”: Maurile de Saint-Michel, Le Père, Voyage des îles Camercanes, en l’Amérique (Au Mans: H. Olivier, 1652), Preface.
“detestable pudding”: The shocked Chevalier d’Arvieux, sailing to Egypt on an English ship in 1658, quoted in Lewis, W. H., The Splendid Century: Life in the France of Louis XIV (New York: Morrow, 1954), 227.
“Most of our passengers”: Maurile de Saint-Michel, 9.
“all of a heap”: Quoted in Bates, 77.
“One doesn’t return”: This was Georges d’Aubusson de la Feuillade, Bishop of Metz, whom Madame de Sévigné described as “a courtier to outdo all other courtiers.” See the letter of July 20, 1679, to the comte de Bussy-Rabutin and Madame de Coligny, in Sévigné, Marie, marquise de, Lettres, 3 vols (Paris: Pléiade, 1960), II, no. 574, 435. The Bishop’s remark is quoted in d’Aumale, 16. Merle places this incident on the return voyage to France, on the assumption that Françoise must have caught a tropical fever while in the islands. Françoise Chandernagor, in L’Allée du Roi: Souvenirs de Françoise d’Aubigne, marquise de Maintenon, épouse du Roi de France (Paris: France Loisirs, 1981), also places it on the return voyage.
Fort Royal: Renamed Fort-de-France by Napoleon in 1801, despite being under English occupation at the time. The town is still known by this latter name.
been established: Guadeloupe was claimed for France on June 28, 1635, by Captain Charles Lyénard de l’Olive and Jean du Plessis. See Lara, Oruno, La Guadeloupe dans l’histoire (Paris: Harmattan, 1979), 20 ff.
the island outright: On September 4, 1649, Houël bought the island from the Compagnie des îles de l’Amérique, for 73,000 livres, payable in silver and sugar. This purchase included Marie-Galante and several other small islands, dependencies of Guadeloupe. With the land were sold the islands’ buildings, plantations, and slaves. See Lara, 31.
“naked savages”: Moreau, Jean-Pierre (ed.), Un Flibustier français dans la mer des Antilles Paris: Payot & Rivages, 2002), 105.
later to be: The infamous Code Noir (Black Code) was introduced only in 1685, by Louis XIV, greatly restricting the activities of slaves and introducing much new cruelty in their treatment. The Code also regulated relations between slave and owner, and required all Jews to be “chased from the islands.” Guadeloupe’s first African inhabitants had in fact been born in the Christian households of Seville and brought to the island at the beginning of the sixteenth century as supposed middlemen/evangelists to the Carib Indians. It was not until the 1660s that serious sugar cultivation began on Guadeloupe (and also Martinique). As this crop required more labour to grow than most others in the tropics, it was at this point that the number of slaves began to outpace the number of colonists.
“I loved oranges”: D’Aumale, 17.
“how a clever girl”: Caylus, Marthe-Marguerite, comtesse de, Souvenirs, ed. Bernard No�
�l (Paris: Mercure de France, 1965 et 1986), 23.
“Assured of your loyalty”: Quoted in Merle, 123. At this period, the French trading Companies, as distinct from those in England, were typically founded and funded by the government. See Rich, E. E. and C. H. Wilson (eds), The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol IV: The Economy of Expanding Europe in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967), 240 ff.
new-bought slaves: Mademoiselle d’Aumale records hearing Françoise, in later life, say that her mother had “up to 24 maids” in Martinique. See d’Aumale, 14.
Greeks and Romans: The Parallel Lives had been rediscovered during the Italian Renaissance after centuries of obscurity. Its first French translation appeared in 1559.
“If you want to be happy”: D’Aumale, 18.
“My brother insisted”: “Instruction aux demoiselles de la classe bleue,” in Leroy, Pierre-E. et Marcel Loyau (eds), Comment la sagesse vient aux filles: Propos d’éducation (Paris: Bartillart, 1998), no. 18, 93–4.
“There is an extreme pleasure”: Maurile de Saint Michel, Preface.
“I imagined”: D’Aumale, 17.
The Secret Wife of Louis XIV: Françoise d'Aubigné, Madame de Maintenon Page 50