Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Katie Lambert, joined today by Sarah Dowdy. How are you, Sarah?
Speaker 1: I'm great, Katie. How are you click? Um. Today we're
Speaker 1: gonna be talking about the ultimate rags to riches story,
Speaker 1: So pretty excited. Everyone likes a rags to riches story.
Speaker 1: And today we've got Madame de Montenal, the mistress or
Speaker 1: was it wife of Louis the four team, But she
Speaker 1: wasn't born Madame de Montenal. She was born Francoise d'aubigner
Speaker 1: in November of six and at the time her father
Speaker 1: was actually in the in a prison. Her mother was
Speaker 1: the daughter of his prison guard. Um. Although Madame de
Speaker 1: marten or Francoise at the time, was not actually born
Speaker 1: in prison. That's a little his historical myth that you
Speaker 1: might hear toss you're busting you're busting it. And though
Speaker 1: I believed it earlier in the day. Her father was
Speaker 1: in prison for a conspiracy against Rigelio, but he'd also
Speaker 1: been accused of abduction and rape. So he's really not
Speaker 1: a stand up guy. He's kind of a loser, even
Speaker 1: though his father is a pretty impressive guy, is a
Speaker 1: celebrated poet. Yeah, Huguenot soldier companion of Henry the fourth,
Speaker 1: but those traits were not passed on to his son,
Speaker 1: and being a Huguenot made them something of an outsiders. Then.
Speaker 1: You know, France was very Catholic, but her mother was Catholic,
Speaker 1: so she got a Catholic baptism, even though she was
Speaker 1: raised Protestant, which turned out to be fortunate later in life. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So she's raised with her relatives until about age seven
Speaker 1: when the family all ups and moves to the island
Speaker 1: of Murray Gallant, which is, you know, on the other
Speaker 1: side of the ocean. Her father hoped he was going
Speaker 1: to get a governor a position, but when they get there,
Speaker 1: you know, oops, there's no position. It's not vacant. So
Speaker 1: he heads back to France and leaves them behind. Thanks.
Speaker 1: So that wasn't really good fortune for them, and Francoise's
Speaker 1: childhood at this point had been not so great. When
Speaker 1: she was living with relatives, she was definitely treated as
Speaker 1: their their poor relation, and she wore their cast off
Speaker 1: clothes and didn't have a fire in her room, so
Speaker 1: she was well acquainted with what poverty looked like and
Speaker 1: in contrast, what a nicer life looked like. Definitely, But
Speaker 1: by the time she's back in France, when you know,
Speaker 1: she and her mother and brothers finally leave Martinique Um.
Speaker 1: She goes back to live with her aunt, but because
Speaker 1: her aunt is Protestant, another Catholic aunt ends up claiming
Speaker 1: her and moves her. Yes, I think a relative of
Speaker 1: her godmother actually, So she takes her to Paris at
Speaker 1: the age of sixteen, and she's raised pretty sternly by
Speaker 1: this relative. Yes, she's not worldly at all at this point.
Speaker 1: And she goes there and she's very eager to please,
Speaker 1: and she's pretty, if she's a bit too tan for
Speaker 1: the standards of the time. And she's also very feminine.
Speaker 1: So after her mother dies, her guardian is faced with
Speaker 1: this orphan teenage orphan decides she's going to try to
Speaker 1: unload or try to marry her off. Along comes a
Speaker 1: satirical writer, Paul Scoun, who was twenty five years older
Speaker 1: than France Swaws and also severely crippled by arthritis. Right,
Speaker 1: and he wasn't again a real stand up guy. He
Speaker 1: was kind of shady judging from what we read, I
Speaker 1: keep on seeing his name linked with the word rascal,
Speaker 1: which is what you want for a sixteen year old girl.
Speaker 1: In her marriage in sixteen fifty two, he made her
Speaker 1: an offer which was marry me or I'll give you
Speaker 1: the dowry you need to be in a convent, and
Speaker 1: France Laws had no interest in being a nun. She
Speaker 1: later said, I preferred to marry him rather than a convent,
Speaker 1: so she chose the marriage, and she wasn't particularly pleased
Speaker 1: with marriage. She's quoted as saying, don't hope for perfect
Speaker 1: happiness from marriage to someone else's advice. And no one
Speaker 1: knows if their marriage was actually consummated. No. Once again,
Speaker 1: he had very bad arthritis, but um, judging by his rascal,
Speaker 1: I don't behavior. No one's quite sure. They think if
Speaker 1: there may have been attempts made at least, but she
Speaker 1: wasn't interested in sex after that, so I'm assuming it
Speaker 1: didn't go well for little France Laws. But she does
Speaker 1: end up nursing him and running his salon, where she
Speaker 1: meets a lot of very influential important people, and she
Speaker 1: learns to become a very good conversationalist and an even
Speaker 1: better listener, which again will serve her well because those
Speaker 1: were considered great virtues and woman at the time as
Speaker 1: they are now. Who doesn't want to have a good conversation. Um,
Speaker 1: So obviously, this teenage girl married to this crippled satirical
Speaker 1: writer uh presiding over his saloon, has a lot of
Speaker 1: offers or flirtations from his visitors, but most people think
Speaker 1: she resisted that, although she sort of perfected the art
Speaker 1: of flirtation, but she kept her reputation largely intact, which
Speaker 1: served her well later. Again, yes, she was a forward
Speaker 1: thinker from Salas Dubner well, I guess from Slis Garran
Speaker 1: at this point. But eight years into their marriage, Paul
Speaker 1: Scarand dies and there are some scirless rumors that pop
Speaker 1: up yet again that after his death, perhaps she had
Speaker 1: engaged in a little bit more than flirtation. One source
Speaker 1: said she even considered becoming a courtesan, but ended up
Speaker 1: taking a room at a convent and sort of becoming
Speaker 1: a saloon lady instead of respectable, well read woman of culture.
Speaker 1: She may have had lovers at this point though, although
Speaker 1: if she did, she was very discreet and almost considered
Speaker 1: somewhat of a prude or at least extremely devout. Right,
Speaker 1: we came into we came to blows about this earlier.
Speaker 1: That's not entirely true, because I was reading Antonia Fraser's
Speaker 1: Love and Louis the fourteenth, which is what I was
Speaker 1: doing a lot of my research on, and Sarah had
Speaker 1: different sources, and a lot of them disagree. So Sarah's
Speaker 1: going to go ahead and say that she had lovers,
Speaker 1: and I am going to maintain that she did not.
Speaker 1: She discreet with her lovers. But she was also known
Speaker 1: for being very virtuous, and she really loved children, which
Speaker 1: was actually unusual at the time because childhood hadn't been
Speaker 1: so sentimentalized as it is now, so people didn't think
Speaker 1: that women should fall and over children. It wasn't really expected.
Speaker 1: But she really loved being around them and teaching them
Speaker 1: to read and teaching them their catechism. And this is
Speaker 1: how her next opportunity comes up. Well, and before we
Speaker 1: even go into that, she really walked the line quite
Speaker 1: well between uh, this motherly devout persona and something a
Speaker 1: little more sensual, and she maintained a friendship with the
Speaker 1: most famous courtisan at the time and still managed to
Speaker 1: you know, come out of that with a solid reputation,
Speaker 1: you know, in part because of this very motherly um
Speaker 1: face she put forward. Well, and I love the detail
Speaker 1: that she apparently loved fine petticoats. And she went to
Speaker 1: her confessor one day and he'd said, you know, I
Speaker 1: know you say you always wear normal things, but I
Speaker 1: can tell by the russell you know you're wearing something
Speaker 1: nice through the screen under the dress. So she wasn't
Speaker 1: immune from vanity. So Francois great opportunity comes in sixteen
Speaker 1: sixty eight when her friend Marie de Montespa, who was
Speaker 1: the king's favorite mistress at the time, gets pregnant and
Speaker 1: she was offered the position of taking care of the
Speaker 1: royal bastards because they were, you know, the King's kids,
Speaker 1: but they were also supposed to be a bit out
Speaker 1: of a spotlight. So he ended up buying a house
Speaker 1: for her to take care of all of them in.
Speaker 1: And she asked her confessor, the abbeg o Blam, whether
Speaker 1: she should do this or not, you know, do you
Speaker 1: take the post as governess? And he said yes, that
Speaker 1: it was her duty or possibly even her holy destiny. Again,
Speaker 1: according to the book I was reading, and this is
Speaker 1: where her good reputation in her discretion really come into play. Uh,
Speaker 1: Marie de Montespa was married, obviously the king was married,
Speaker 1: so these kids were We're more secret than you might expect.
Speaker 1: Francois's role is literally like whisking away these children to
Speaker 1: their new residents and caring for them. And that made
Speaker 1: for a bit of friction between her and the royal
Speaker 1: stress because it's always hard, I think child care when
Speaker 1: someone's with your children all day long and you were not,
Speaker 1: So they didn't necessarily get along as much as one
Speaker 1: would have hoped. And apparently fran sUAS thought about quitting
Speaker 1: or maybe even becoming a nun, and we know how
Speaker 1: she felt about that. It must not have been very
Speaker 1: fun for her. Now, plus the king is starting to notice,
Speaker 1: uh the widow scarone a little more, and he's making
Speaker 1: his visits. He's you know, he's visiting his kids, and oh,
Speaker 1: their lovely governess also happens to be there. So they're
Speaker 1: starting to get to know each other but well, and
Speaker 1: she is so different from Marie de Montespond because she
Speaker 1: is so very motherly, whereas you know, his mistress is
Speaker 1: very very sensual and very sexual and demanding and demanding
Speaker 1: fran sUAS is subservient and motherly, and he'd come to
Speaker 1: see her, you know, and she'd have children in her lash.
Speaker 1: She's very serious, very good, intelligent. You could kind of
Speaker 1: imagine them having a quiet conversation, right. She wasn't necessarily
Speaker 1: very funny, maybe or even extremely entertaining, but she was
Speaker 1: clearly a sweet woman and one who had her head
Speaker 1: on straight. So in sixteen seventy four, the King gives
Speaker 1: from sUAS quite a bit of money, and as a reward,
Speaker 1: she buys land at Mantena, which is about twenty five
Speaker 1: miles from their side, because it reminded her where she
Speaker 1: used to live when she was a kid with her relatives.
Speaker 1: And this is when she gets her title Madame de Montenen,
Speaker 1: which the King gives her permission to use, because you
Speaker 1: can't just do that on your own. And I like
Speaker 1: the detail, according to Fraser's book, that she insisted her
Speaker 1: Linen's bestored with lavender as her fragrance instead of rose petals,
Speaker 1: which is sounds lovely. It was usually it does sound lovely,
Speaker 1: and for people who are wondering if you know, the
Speaker 1: King promoting her in this way kind of out the
Speaker 1: whole secret household of his illegitimate children. He had actually
Speaker 1: recognized his his illegitimate children the year before, so they
Speaker 1: were getting titles and more out in the open than
Speaker 1: they had been, and he had quite a few of them.
Speaker 1: He had a lot, was very fertile, and it wasn't
Speaker 1: just two or three kids in a house. We're talking
Speaker 1: a lot of kids. And their family tree gets so
Speaker 1: confusing at this point if you try to go and
Speaker 1: look at one. But a change comes in the king's
Speaker 1: relationship with his mistress in the Easter of sixteen seventy
Speaker 1: five when a priest refuses to give absolution to the
Speaker 1: king's mistress and he and the mistress end up breaking
Speaker 1: up because they both think that they're going to be damned.
Speaker 1: But the king and his mistress were a pretty good couple,
Speaker 1: and he was still in love with her, and he
Speaker 1: spent a lot of money on her property. He tried
Speaker 1: to have other affairs to sort of stay away from her,
Speaker 1: you know, too, didn't occur to him to stop having
Speaker 1: sex rebound rebound affairs. Um. But the two and back
Speaker 1: and up back together and they have even more kids
Speaker 1: and um after those last kids are born. Though the
Speaker 1: sexual relationships stops and from sUAS at this point is
Speaker 1: also very worried about the king's salvation. Like this had
Speaker 1: become a nationwide thing. People in France were talking about
Speaker 1: the king and whether he was going to hell for
Speaker 1: having this mistress, because adultery was considered so much worse
Speaker 1: than fornication. They were both people exactly engaging in the
Speaker 1: sexual relationship, and people truly thought, you know, their king
Speaker 1: was going to hell. So no one knows quite when
Speaker 1: fran sUAS and the King became lovers. Originally she tried
Speaker 1: to be his friend, but she was very concerned with
Speaker 1: the idea of salvation, and at some point must have
Speaker 1: realized that unless she was sleeping with the king, someone
Speaker 1: else was going to be. Yeah, there needed to be
Speaker 1: that extra dimension to their relationship, so she stepped up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: even though it's ironic that at the time she's also
Speaker 1: persuading the king to sort of rekindle his romance with
Speaker 1: his wife, which made the Queen Marie Torre very happy.
Speaker 1: You know, she had very much missed her husband, and
Speaker 1: that just sort of goes along with francois a virtuous thing.
Speaker 1: She thought it was very important that he was involved
Speaker 1: with his wife. And if she thought she could save
Speaker 1: him and having a sexual relationship with him was necessary,
Speaker 1: then the means at some point justified the ends, and
Speaker 1: she wrote to her confessor that maybe her small acts
Speaker 1: of charity made up for some of the bad things
Speaker 1: that she was doing. So obviously things are winding down
Speaker 1: with the king's former mistress, Marie de Montespa, and that
Speaker 1: really comes to a close when she's accused of participating
Speaker 1: in a black mass and buying poison. This was a
Speaker 1: while back, and it's very sensationalized and just a lot
Speaker 1: of rumors flying, but it's further bad press basically to
Speaker 1: their already stormy relationship, and it's so tabloid scandalous it's ridiculous,
Speaker 1: like all the poison she bought and her designs upon
Speaker 1: the king, when it would have made no sense for
Speaker 1: her to poison the king at all, because that's how
Speaker 1: she had what she had, so why would she even
Speaker 1: want to do that? Um And at the same time,
Speaker 1: people in the court are really confused about what's going
Speaker 1: on with Francoise and the king. You know what, what
Speaker 1: kind of relationship are they actually Are they even having
Speaker 1: a sexual relationship or is she really just she that devout.
Speaker 1: Are they just friends? Is she his you know, spiritual
Speaker 1: advisor or is something else going on? And she has
Speaker 1: this weird set of rooms at fair Side. They are
Speaker 1: very tiny and they aren't well heated, and at this
Speaker 1: point she's starting to develop arthritis, so it's really not
Speaker 1: comfortable for her. And this is in contrast to like
Speaker 1: his mistress's rooms or the queen's rooms, which are sums.
Speaker 1: Some historians think six eight two is when her rel
Speaker 1: fationship began with a king, because she started kind of
Speaker 1: freaking out about making her Easter in six eight three.
Speaker 1: Because I'm still a little confused about this. I'm not
Speaker 1: going to lie, but it was very public and you
Speaker 1: had to go do your penance, you know, in your
Speaker 1: confession beforehand, and then make this public appearance. And if
Speaker 1: you were, say, living in sin, then you wouldn't want
Speaker 1: to be doing It's a religious right, oh yes, but
Speaker 1: also a very public one. So she was really uncomfortable
Speaker 1: with that right then. So we're thinking something had started
Speaker 1: at that point, and there's a big development in s Yes,
Speaker 1: the poor neglected queen dies and um Louise actually early
Speaker 1: sad about it. He says that that was the most
Speaker 1: dying is the most trouble she ever gave him. But
Speaker 1: she sat at the picture and um, Louie is ready
Speaker 1: to move on. And her last words, as a side note,
Speaker 1: I think you're so sad. Supposedly she said, since I
Speaker 1: have been queen, I have had only one happy day.
Speaker 1: It is and I think his is even sadder. That's
Speaker 1: the only trouble she ever gave it. And did given
Speaker 1: him more trouble, Marie Tourne. So the king isn't super old,
Speaker 1: and um, the kingdom wants him to marry again, and
Speaker 1: he seems like he doesn't want to or did because
Speaker 1: he said to have engaged in a Morganatic marriage with
Speaker 1: from squaws. And if you've never heard of it, it's
Speaker 1: a marriage that was legal within the church but not
Speaker 1: the state. So you get married in a chapel with witnesses,
Speaker 1: but then you don't register it anywhere, so legally it's
Speaker 1: not recognized, but it is sanctioned by the church. It's
Speaker 1: for two parties who are not social equals. Right, so
Speaker 1: in the eyes of God, you're married, whereas the eyes
Speaker 1: of the public would think it was a ridiculous match.
Speaker 1: I think you should be marrying some princess us oversimplify it, right,
Speaker 1: and your kids wouldn't inherit your title or anything if
Speaker 1: you had a Morganatic marriage, But that wasn't really an
Speaker 1: issue by then anyways, since from sUAS is in her
Speaker 1: early fifties and she's past the point of having children.
Speaker 1: And we think this might have happened in October of
Speaker 1: that year in the old chapel at Versailles, because after
Speaker 1: this she had a new status from Suaz could sit
Speaker 1: down in the presence of royalty, and the pope showed
Speaker 1: her respect and sent her gifts, so he must have
Speaker 1: known about the relationship, or obviously he wouldn't have been
Speaker 1: doing it. And she also got better rooms in the palace.
Speaker 1: And she also, you know, obviously had an ear with
Speaker 1: the king and increasingly influenced his religious behavior and the
Speaker 1: court life that vers i. Um it's less like the
Speaker 1: glorious Versailles son King court that you imagine at this point.
Speaker 1: It's more toned down. Um. But a lot of historians
Speaker 1: debate how much influence she really had. Politically, she was
Speaker 1: sort of demonized after her death for you know, just
Speaker 1: convincing him to make all these awful mistakes and do
Speaker 1: all these awful things. Um, but it's pretty likely she
Speaker 1: didn't have much to do with anything before Sevre at least,
Speaker 1: and certainly didn't have anything to do with the um
Speaker 1: revocation of the Edictive Knots, which denied the denied rights
Speaker 1: to all the Protestants in France. It was a pretty
Speaker 1: pretty big deal when she thought. She's recorded as saying
Speaker 1: something along the lines of, you know, if you want
Speaker 1: a better life in this world and the next, maybe
Speaker 1: you'd better be Catholic. Because clearly it was in one's
Speaker 1: bust interests in France at the time to convert to Catholicism.
Speaker 1: So she was fairly practical about that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: And also, again her personality was pretty subservient. She was
Speaker 1: obedient to the king, so it's not like she was
Speaker 1: going to go requesting favors from him all the time.
Speaker 1: In six she found a school for impoverished noble women. Um.
Speaker 1: It's usually just called sacr um, but she really got
Speaker 1: to go back to her motherly teaching inclinations. Here another
Speaker 1: things she loved taking care of children and raising them.
Speaker 1: The teachers of the school were known as the dom
Speaker 1: and the students were called the demoiselle. Of Salois, And
Speaker 1: this is when the king kind of gets to switch
Speaker 1: to a patriarchal role instead of his former rather lecherous one,
Speaker 1: because he was known for how much he loved young women,
Speaker 1: but there was nothing untoured about his relationship with the
Speaker 1: girls at Saints Here, and Francois cared about every detail
Speaker 1: of this school. She provided dentistry services to the girls,
Speaker 1: and she was interested in details from everything to themingerie
Speaker 1: to their food. And the object of this school, you know,
Speaker 1: is to make them good Christian women. And she told
Speaker 1: them to be cheerful and to learn to speak French
Speaker 1: with the correct accent and study religious texts. But they
Speaker 1: were also allowed to study theater because the king was
Speaker 1: such a big fan. And they even have a racine
Speaker 1: writes esther for the school, and they perform it a
Speaker 1: bunch of times. But it's so kind of parallel to
Speaker 1: the King's life that he has to add a prologue
Speaker 1: at the end to let this is not actually about
Speaker 1: the son king, but his health starts to decline quite
Speaker 1: a bit in sixteen eighties six, not that it was
Speaker 1: all that great to begin with. His idea of dinner
Speaker 1: was a pheasant, a partridge, four kinds of soup, a
Speaker 1: large salad, two slices of ham mutton with gravy, a
Speaker 1: plate of sweet cakes, fruit, and hard boiled eggs. Something
Speaker 1: about the eggs at the end of the meal, just
Speaker 1: like puts it over the final straw, but imagining eating
Speaker 1: all that and then topping a few hard boiled eggs.
Speaker 1: So by this time he's being purged once a month
Speaker 1: and given enemas of milk, honey and almond oil. He
Speaker 1: has a boil on his thigh and has a terrible
Speaker 1: case of gout. He could hardly walk, and gout is
Speaker 1: incredibly painful. If you don't know any rich food, we'll
Speaker 1: do it shellfish and drinking. And then he got an
Speaker 1: anal fistula which had to be operated on, and there
Speaker 1: was no anesthetics, so surgery was painful, more painful than
Speaker 1: I would even like to imagine. Let's let's move on
Speaker 1: from so, moving on to her health, which is a
Speaker 1: little less gory um but still very disabling. She suffered
Speaker 1: from rheumatism, and the King insists on having all the
Speaker 1: windows open, which is not the most cozy environment for
Speaker 1: someone with rheumatism, and the cold especially it was really
Speaker 1: hard for her. But more health troubles hit in seventeen
Speaker 1: eleven and seventeen twelve, when smallpox and means hit the
Speaker 1: royal family and kill quite a few members all in
Speaker 1: a row, and it was absolutely devastating for the king
Speaker 1: and for everyone else, sudden, very sad deaths. And by
Speaker 1: the summer of seventeen fifteen, Louis is starting to look
Speaker 1: pretty sick. And I was really surprised to learn this,
Speaker 1: but bookies actually start taking bets on whether he would die.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's like some kind of death watch website
Speaker 1: or something. Now we have those now, and we had
Speaker 1: them in the seventeen hundreds. So he has gout hardening
Speaker 1: of the arteries, and his leg has um started to
Speaker 1: get a case of gang green, which I mean, all
Speaker 1: you can do is amputate at that point once it's
Speaker 1: gotten that bad. And they didn't want to amputate the
Speaker 1: king's leg. But he was still participating in festivals and things,
Speaker 1: or at least trying to oversee them, and he said,
Speaker 1: I have lived among the people of my court. I
Speaker 1: want to die among them. They have followed the whole
Speaker 1: course of my life. It is right that they should
Speaker 1: witness the end of it, and he started declining pretty quickly,
Speaker 1: and told the five year old Duke d'Anjou that he
Speaker 1: would make a good king, and then also told him
Speaker 1: to remain at peace with your neighbors, because Louis the
Speaker 1: fourteenth had quote loved war too much unquote and the
Speaker 1: king in France walls have a few interactions kind of
Speaker 1: in this decline. She comes and visits him from the
Speaker 1: school um, and he was actually worried about her because
Speaker 1: she didn't really have anything in terms of money now,
Speaker 1: and he hadn't lavished money on her as he had
Speaker 1: with didn't just ask for it. She didn't even want
Speaker 1: it with us. What she did have a lot of
Speaker 1: it she donated to charity or put into the school.
Speaker 1: Her her house she had given to her niece and um.
Speaker 1: She was very generous, but not that demanding herself. The
Speaker 1: king gave her a rosary and she helped him burn
Speaker 1: his papers, and he carried a miniature of a portrait
Speaker 1: of her in his westcoat pocket it until he died,
Speaker 1: which I think is a very sweet detail. And he
Speaker 1: died September one, seventeen fifteen, and as a true marker
Speaker 1: of her position as the king's wife, if not the Queen.
Speaker 1: Foreign dignitaries end up sending her letters of condolence, the
Speaker 1: type of letters that you would send to the queen,
Speaker 1: and mentioning her very special loss and how hard they
Speaker 1: knew it must be for her. She's been in his
Speaker 1: life for a long time, thirty plus years. So she
Speaker 1: went on to live at the school, and Peter the
Speaker 1: Great came to visit her, apparently, and she died at
Speaker 1: eighty four, and as a true measure of her standing,
Speaker 1: her ashes were disentered during the French Revolution, just like
Speaker 1: all the other royals, so she got the same scanual treatment.
Speaker 1: If you want to hear more about where things went
Speaker 1: from that point, check out how the French Revolution worked,
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