Marie-Antoinette, Daughter of the Caesars

by Elena Maria Vidal

  In the late 1730’s, Louis XV’s finance minister Cardinal Fleury convinced him that the cost of rearing all of his daughters at court was growing too expensive. It was decided therefore to send the five youngest children, including the baby Madame Louise, to the Benedictine Abbey of Fontevraud in Normandy to be brought up. As Adélaïde, Victoire, Sophie, Thérèse, and Louise were being made ready to travel, six year old Adélaïde began to have a tantrum, begging not to be sent away. Her parents relented and so Madame Adélaïde (1732-1800) grew up at Versailles. Of the daughters of Louis XV, she was one of the most comely and ambitious. After her sister Henriette’s death, Adélaïde became the sister with whom her father rode and talked. It caused the evil-minded to spread a rumor that the King had an incestuous relationship with his own daughter and that she was the mother of his illegitimate son the Comte de Narbonne. No serious historian has ever given credence to the story. But it shows that Antoinette was not alone in being targeted with grotesque libels.

  Adélaïde became a generous benefactress of many charities for the poor and a patroness of the arts, particularly of women artists. She never married because there was at the time no prince of high enough rank for a Daughter of France. Louis XV enjoyed bestowing funny nicknames on his children and for some inexpicable reason Adélaïde was dubbed Loque (“Rags.”) Madame Campan notes in her memoirs that the Princess had an abrupt, domineering manner and a choleric temper, as well as “a most insatiable desire to learn: she was taught to play on all the instruments, from the French horn…to the Jew’s harp.”12 In addition to music, Madame Adélaïde occupied herself with the study of Italian, English, calculus, painting, the potter’s wheel and watchmaking. Working with her brother the Dauphin, she was head of the Devout Party and was strongly against La Pompadour and all her works, including the Austrian Alliance. When her brother and his wife died, she tried to mother his orphaned children. The young Duc de Berry (Louis XVI) was very much under her spell. Worried that Berry was too quiet, Madame Adélaïde once told him to run, shout, and break anything he wanted in her apartments.13

  After the death of her mother the Queen, Adélaïde was the highest ranking lady at the French court, and remained so until the arrival of Antoinette. It has been claimed that she coined the phrase L’Auchrichienne to describe her nephew’s foreign wife. Her relationship with Antoinette was always a complex one. On the surface Adélaïde displayed loving concern for Antoinette, giving her the key to the apartments of the Mesdames, and being a font of motherly advice. In her role of aunt she was probably sincere. In her role of princess and politician she was threatened and worried by the effervescent and effortlessly beguiling teenager, who in her view imperiled not only the equilibrium of the Dauphin but might possibly acquire influence with the King himself. Ironically, Madame du Barry was likewise menaced by the pretty new Dauphine, who showed by her pert answers that she was quite capable of quashing any rivals to her position as First Lady of France. The fact that Madame Adélaïde adroitly tried to use Antoinette to humiliate La Barry by encouraging the princess to snub the concubine, thereby driving a wedge between Antoinette and Louis XV, shows that Adélaïde was cunning and determined when it came to games of power. She also built a rampart between Antoinette and her husband by keeping young Louis from even trying to consummate the marriage for years, thus isolating the Austrian girl and neutralizing any influence she might have had. All of this was to backfire, of course, and become part of the tragedy of the fall of the monarchy. Adélaïde herself was to die in exile in a faraway land, the last of the children of Louis XV amd Marie Leszczyńska.

  Madame Victoire (1733-1799) was five when she was sent from home to live at the medieval Abbey of Fontevraud with her three little sisters. The Abbey was famous for being the burial place of the first Plantagenet king of England, Henry II and his Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, as well as their son Richard I. Although French princesses had been educated there for centuries, it is still odd that such small girls were sent so far from home when the excellent school of Saint Cyr, founded by the second wife of Louis XIV for the sole purpose of educating aristocratic young ladies, was practically on the grounds of Versailles. We can only guess that the drafty Norman monastery offered a less expensive tuition than the stylish girls’ school. The princesses were nevertheless accompanied by an extensive entourage, including a steward, ten maids, twelve bodyguards, a policeman, a dancing master and a music master. They had several carriages, coachmen, postilions, grooms, outriders, thirty-two horses and four donkeys. The Abbess herself served them at table, having been elevated to the rank of Duchess so as to be in accord with etiquette. They had, however, no doctor, which was to have tragic repercussions. In 1744, Madame Thérèse, eight years old, contracted smallpox; there was no one to give her medical care but the local barber. 14 The little girl died and was buried with the Plantagenets. Whenever she transgressed the rules of the Abbey, Madame Victoire was sent to pray among the tombs as a penance, which for the rest of her life caused her to struggle with “paroxysms of terror”15 which in modern times we might interpret as panic attacks.

  When her education was completed, Victoire returned to Versailles at age fifteen to take up her role as a Daughter of France. For Victoire, this meant being ruled by Adélaïde, and together they acted as patronesses of the arts and sponsored many charities. Victoire was particularly generous with all that she had. Of nervous temperament, she found solace in her food, and struggled during Lent when it came to giving up her favorite dishes. This may explain the nickname her father gave her: Coche or “Old Sow.” Madame Campan tells the story of how a visiting bishop soothed Madame Victoire’s scruples by telling her she was not required to abstain from her beloved waterfowl, as it was considered more fish than fowl.16 She grew plump; her dark beauty, inherited from her father as seen in the Nattier portraits, became a memory. Victoire was devastated when her youngest sister Louise became a nun. In the end, she was one of the last of her sisters to die, witnessing all the disasters which were to overtake her House, scattering and killing most of her family.

  One of the many advantages of having the younger princesses brought up in a monastery is that for ever after any eccentricities they displayed could be blamed upon their early existence as convent boarders. Thus when Madame Sophie of France (1734-1782) displayed bashfulness by not looking people in the eye, it is forgotten that her father Louis XV also struggled with shyness, and was attributed solely to her years of monastic seclusion. Like Victoire, who also survived Fontevraud, Sophie returned to court at age fifteen. Madame Campan, who was Reader to the Mesdames, has harsh words for Madame Sophie in her memoirs, depicting her as “ugly” and generally bizarre beyond words, scurrying from place to place with sideway glances like a rabbit.17 However, as Madame Delors points out, Madame Campan’s portrayal of Sophie should be taken with circumscription. To quote:

  Madame Campan herself gives us the key to her animosity towards Sophie: the princess ‘read alone.’ That is, she didn’t need Madame Campan’s services as a Reader. Imagine if every princess had shown similar insolence! Madame Campan, heaven forbid, would have become obsolete. She took her revenge, a petty one, by leaving us this venomous portrait of the princess.18

  For reasons perhaps known only to himself, Louis XV called her Graille or “Scrap.” She especially dreaded thunderstorms. For many years, a portrait of Madame Sophie by Lié-Louis Périn-Salbreux was considered to be of Antoinette, but it was finally recognized by the unique parquet design on the floor from Madame Sophie’s apartments. The gown, too, is not fashionable and would never have been worn by the style-conscious twenty-one year old Queen. The dark eyes are certainly not those of Antoinette.19 Louis XVI held all of his aunts in high regard, and after Sophie died of dropsy in 1782 while still in her forties, the King and Queen named their youngest daughter after her. There is speculation based upon her behaviors that Sophie may have had a mild form of Asperger’s syndrome, which some think her nephew Louis XVI also had. In that case, the beh
aviors had nothing to do with growing up in a monastery but were purely neurological.

  Madame Louise-Marie of France (1737-1787), also known as Blessed Thérèse de Saint-Augustin, was the youngest daughter of King Louis XV and Queen Marie Leszczynska. The descendant of Saint Louis, she was later to become the spiritual daughter of Saint Teresa of Avila. Like her sisters she was reared by the Benedictines. She managed to glean the best from both monastic life and from court life: a disciplined but warm personality, radiant with the love of God, as well as a strong sense of noblesse-oblige towards the disadvantaged. Only a babe-in-arms when she was sent to Fontevraud, her nature was bolder than her sisters, as exemplified by the manner in which she determinedly tried to climb out of her crib as a toddler, only to fall on the stone floor and be found unconscious by the nurse.20 The same surgeon-barber who later presided over the death of Madame Thérèse was summoned and in spite of his insistence that the princess was uninjured, as she learned to walk it became clear that her body leaned to the left and her back was slightly hunched as if with scoliosis.21 None of the physical damage hindered the expansion of her kindly disposition; as her mother the Queen wrote of her: “I have never seen so sweet, so touching a face as the little one’s, though it is pinched with sadness. There is something moving, gentle, and spiritual about her.”23

  Returning to Versailles as a young teenager, her father gave her the nickname of Chiffe or “bad silk.” Louise visited the Carmelites with her mother and longed to become a nun. There was a plan to marry her off to Bonnie Prince Charlie, but it came to nothing. Before entering the cloister, she tried to assist the Jesuits who had been abolished from France. Knowing she would have limited access to books once she was in the monastery, she had Madame Campan read for five hours a day works of history, an indulgence for whch she later apologized to the Reader.24 She was asked by Archbishop Beaumont to postpone her entry into Carmel for several years, due to the many deaths in her family; the prelate knowing that the loss of Madame Louise to the cloister would be more than her surviving sisters could bear.25

  In 1770, at age thirty-three, Louise chose the poorest and most rigorous Carmelite monastery in France, that of Saint Denis, very close to the Basilica where the Princess’ mother Queen Marie was buried. There she begged to be treated the same as the rest of the nuns. Although she had prepared herself for the hardships of monastic life, what she found most difficult was using a certain narrow and steep staircase. The princess was used to being escorted up and down the wide, shallow stairs of the palace.26 In spite of the steep stairs, and the mockery of persons such as Voltaire, Louise persevered in her calling. After six months, she was given the veil by the papal nuncio, assisted by the young Dauphine Antoinette, her nephew’s bride, who was deeply moved by the clothing ceremony and was close to sobbing aloud. The mantle used at the clothing had belonged to the great Holy Mother St. Teresa herself, lent to the Carmel of St. Denis by the Carmel of the Rue de Saint-Jacques in Paris. Louise was thenceforth called Soeur Thérèse de Saint-Augustin. A year later, on September 12, the Feast of the Holy Name of Mary, the novice pronounced her vows.27 The bells of the monastery began to peal, and then those of the Basilica and parish churches and soon the bells all over France were ringing for joy that Louis XV’s daughter had made an oblation of her life to God. Her mission was to pray for the salvation of France and of France’s King.

  After her arrival at Compiègne, Antoinette had asked to be taken to meet Madame Louise at the Carmel of Saint Denis on May 15, 1770, the eve of her wedding. The Dauphine threw herself into the arms of her new aunt, saying: “I feel that I have an infinite need of your prayers. I shall come again soon.”28 It was the beginning of a close relationship, in which Antoinette would often visit the Carmel, sometimes alone and sometimes with her husband, to seek the prayers of Madame Louise. In her turn, Madame Louise would tell Antoinette about any persons who needed assistance. She often petitioned Antoinette for dowries for impoverished young ladies who wanted to become nuns. One young girl, Mademoiselle Lidoine, to whom the Dauphine gave a dowry at Madame Louise’s plea, became the prioress who led the Blessed Martyrs of Compiègne to the scaffold on July 17, 1794. When she became a mother at last, Antoinette brought her children to meet the nun, and her daughter she prepared by giving the child a doll dressed in the Carmelite habit. A phrase in Madame Campan’s anecdotes, which did not appear in the original memoirs, quotes Antoinette calling Madame Louise “the most intriguing little Carmelite in the kingdom.” Since the quote was not part of the original work, perhaps it was added by editors of later editions. At any rate, it seems unlikely that Antoinette would accuse her husband’s venerable aunt of being an “intriguer.”29 Madame Louise, Blessed Thérèse, died on December 23, 1787, after having inhaled a strange powder that was most likely poisoned. The powder arrived at the Carmel in an anonymous package with some feathers and a note with the words “the relics of the Eternal Father.” Who would want to kill Madame Louise? It seems she had many enemies among those who plotted the Revolution. Her last words were: "Full gallop, into heaven!” Louis XVI and Antoinette must have felt her loss keenly, for hers was a wise voice among many foolish ones.

  The Dauphin Louis-Auguste, Duc de Berry, the future Louis XVI, was born on August 23, 1754. According to the custom in the House of Bourbon, he was baptized at birth but not christened with the holy oils until a later formal ceremony. Like all the boys in the Bourbon family, “Louis” was one of his names. “Auguste” was the second name of St. Louis IX of France and so Berry was doubly named for the sainted crusader-king.30 August 25, the feast of St. Louis, was his name-day, and kept with special festivity when he became King. Louis-Auguste and his brothers and sisters were the last generation of French royals to grow up at Versailles. There were several siblings who did not survive childhood, including the delightful Marie-Zéphyrine, who died in 1755 at age five, and Louis-Joseph-Xavier, the Duc de Bourgogne, who passed away after an agonizing struggle with tuberculosis of the bone at age nine in 1761. Burgogne, as he was called, had been considered the hope of the dynasty and of France, since he was fearless and clever, energetic and daring, another Louis XIV it seemed. However, he fell from a toy horse and shortly afterwards began to limp; it was found he had a tumor in his thigh. An operation ensued but the boy could no longer walk; consumption had set in. Utterly beloved by his parents and grandparents, the very thought of Bourgogne’s death was met with total horror, and every medical option was taken in order to spare his life. His younger brother, the bashful, near-sighted Louis-Auguste, Duc de Berry, had been seen as the unhealthy, extra son. The doctors thought that Berry’s presence might cheer his dying older brother in the sick room. Berry was removed from the nusery and his governess Madame “Maman” Marsan at age five. He was put through the breeching ceremony in which he was dressed in pants for the first time and handed over to the men to bring up. His governor, the Duc de la Vauguyon, dubbed Bourgogne le Fin (the Clever) and Berry le Faible (the Weak). Berry was made to sit with his dying brother. Death from tuberculosis is not pretty to watch; it was surely a tortuous experience for a small boy, especially since he himself contracted tuberculosis and began to cough up blood. But Berry was regarded as not likely to live to adulthood and so worth the sacrifice if it helped Bourgogne. Bourgogne died anyway; the parents were overwhelmed by grief. Berry managed to survive with the proper care. Nevertheless, tuberculosis is a disease which can remain inactive for many years but can later recur. It can have many side effects, including depression, as well as stimulating a voracious appetite; both Louis and his brother Provence struggled with obesity which may have been induced by a tubucular condition.31 The tuberculosis would come back to haunt him, infecting at least two of his children, including the son he would name Louis-Joseph-Xavier after his older brother.

  At the death of his father in 1765, Berry became Dauphin. By the standards of the era, Louis-Auguste could be considered handsome. He had thick dark eyebrows, an aquiline Bourbon nose, deep set, large blue-g
rey eyes, and a full sensual mouth. The Duchess of Northumberland, a friend of Choiseul’s, was at Versailles for Louis and Antoinette’s wedding; she said: “The Dauphin disappointed me much. I expected him to be horrid but I really liked his aspect. He is tall and slender with a très intéressant figure and he seems witty. He has a quite pale complexion and eyes. He has a mass of fair hair very well planted.”32 As a teenager, Louis-Auguste was tall and thin, soon to be the tallest man at Court, and enjoyed intense physical exercise, such as hunting and hammering at his forge. His physical strength became legendary; he could lift a shovel to shoulder height with a young boy standing on the end of it. Possessing a hardy appetite, he developed a paunch as he approached his thirties. He was often clumsy and diffident in his manner although not without dignity in his bearing. The efforts of his detractors to make him unattractive and therefore unlovable serve the purpose of giving his wife an “excuse” for chronic infidelity, another highly-popularized myth.