Louis XIV's favorite daughter Marie-Anne de Bourbon, Princess of Conti

“Hurry up […], I want to be delivered before her return” said Louise de La Vallière to the surgeon feeling unwell during the visit of the Duchess of Orléans. She is the favorite of Louis XIV and lives at court, but all her deliveries must be secret. Thus was born on October 2, 1666, at the Château de Vincennes, as discreetly as possible, Marie-Anne, the first legitimized daughter of Louis XIV and the one he preferred. In his memoirs, speaking of the birth of his daughter, and of his favorite, Louis an establishment suitable to the affection I had for her for six years. »

By Catherine Éclancher, art historian

It was by letter patent of May 14, 1667, that he named Louise Duchess of La Vallière and Vaujours. It is a gift of disgrace because he has just fallen in love with Madame de Montespan. Thus he can recognize his daughter as “the daughter of the lord king” and consider her “legitimate and capable of all honors, rights and civil effects.”

This legitimation associated with the establishment of the mother remains a unique case. Louis XIV, by royal declaration, legitimized all his natural children: a girl and a boy from Louise de La Vallière, and two boys and two girls from Madame de Montespan. He will give them title and land, and make them participate in the life of the court, as Charles IX and Henry IV did in their time. They will be named Count of Vermandois, Duke of Maine and Count of Toulouse, Marie-Anne de Bourbon, known as Mademoiselle de Blois then Princess of Conti, Louise-Marie de Bourbon, called Mademoiselle de Nantes then Madame la Duchess, and finally Françoise-Marie de Bourbon, the second Mademoiselle de Blois, future Duchess of Chartres then of Orléans.

Marie-Anne is very close to Monsignor the Grand Dauphin, her half-brother, but did not know any of the king's legitimate daughters: Anne-Élisabeth of France born and died in 1662, Marie-Thérèse of France (1667-1672) and a little Marie-Anne de France born and died in 1664, who would have been born with black skin. Madame de Motteville, present during the birth of Queen Marie-Thérèse which reportedly went badly, is said to have declared: “She was a Moorish woman from whom she thought she would die! » A legend would have it that this child is Mauresse de Moret, a French Benedictine nun from the convent of Moret-sur-Loing, visited by the royal family, which greatly astonishes the Duke of Saint Simon. The thesis of the Duke of Luynes in 1766 evokes a nun who would be a child entrusted to Madame de Maintenon, born to the black concierges of the King's menagerie.

Marie-Anne, Mademoiselle de Blois

Marie-Anne is raised by Mrs. Colbert. Louis XIV was accustomed from his childhood to having his domestic affairs entrusted to Colbert. It is therefore natural that Colbert and his wife will take care of everything from the birth of the natural children born to Mlle de La Vallière. To justify the arrival of these children, Colbert would have declared that it was one of his brothers who had had children with a quality girl and that it was to save his honor that he took care of them. His wife discreetly raised the bastard children and it is in their home that we see Marie-Anne dancing at the age of seven and a half. “It is a prodigy of pleasure and good grace,” wrote Madame de Sévigné to her daughter. “Beautiful mother”, the nickname of Louise de La Vallière, carefully follows, from the convent where she piously ends her life, the progress of her children raised as princes and princesses of the blood. Thus, Marie-Anne was presented to the court on January 19, 1674: “Mlle de Blois is a masterpiece; the king and everyone are delighted with it” said Madame de Sévigné.

By entering the court, Marie-Anne and her brother Louis, Count of Vermandois, will have their House, which represents twelve people (housekeeper, governor, nurses, maids, valets, servants, kitchen help, scrubber). ), all expenses of which are supervised by Ms. Colbert. The king gives them money at New Year's and festivals, for travel, and purchases of silverware, carriages, horses, and furniture. They have a secret education, but they are the same masters as the king's legitimate children. The princess is one of the most gifted musicians in the royal family with her other half-brother the Count of Toulouse. Jean Henry d'Anglebert, the harpsichordist of the King's Chamber, was his teacher, then François Couperin and Delalande, who dedicated a minute to him.

The loves of a princess

The king has a special affection for her and wants to marry her. He proposed it to the Prince of Orange, then to the Duke of Savoy, but they disdain his advances. 1680 is the big year: the king marries his son the Grand Dauphin and his legitimized daughter Marie-Anne. It is the first marriage between a prince of the blood and an illegitimate child of the king. At thirteen, Marie-Anne married on January 16, 1680, in Saint-Germain-en-Laye Prince Louis-Armand de Bourbon-Conti, who was eighteen years old, then, on March 7, 1680, in the cathedral of Chalons, the king married his son Monsignor the Dauphin, also aged eighteen, to Marie Anne Christine Victoire of Bavaria. He will want to marry all his legitimized daughters to princes of the blood: it is revenge of the king who seeks to dishonor these princes who had revolted against the royal power during the Fronde.

For Marie-Anne, it is the Grand Condé who comes in person to ask for her hand in marriage for his nephew Louis Armand de Conti. On this occasion, the king grants his daughter a queen's dowry: one million pounds plus an annuity of one hundred thousand pounds. Everyone raves about the size of this richly endowed bride: “Tall for a person of her sex… The most beautiful, the wealthiest and the noblest one will perhaps ever live. One of the most beautiful ornaments of the court of France” (Ezekiel Spanheim).

Mme de Sévigné to Mme de Grignan, Paris, December 27, 1679: “The Court is very rejoiced at the marriage of M. le Prince de Conti and Mlle de Blois; they love each other like in the novels. The King made great play of their inclination. He spoke tenderly to his daughter, and that he loved her so much that he did not want to take her away from him. The little one was so touched and so happy that she cried, and the King told her that he saw clearly that she had an aversion to the Prince of Conti. She redoubled her tears; her little heart could not contain so much joy. The King recounted this little scene, and everyone took pleasure in it. For the Prince of Conti, he was transported. He knew neither what he said nor what he did; he passed over all the people he found on his way to find Mademoiselle de Blois. Madame Colbert only wanted him to see her in the evening. He forced open the doors, and fell at his feet and kissed his hand; she, without further ado, kissed him, and there she was again crying. This good little princess is so tender and so pretty that we would like to eat her. Here, my daughter, are many details to entertain Mlle de Grignan. » And she adds: “The King marries his daughter not as his own but as that of the queen, whom he would marry to the king of Spain. » Then, on January 17, 1680: “Miss de Blois is therefore Madame la Princesse de Conti. She was engaged on Monday with great ceremony; yesterday married, in front of the sun, in the chapel of Saint-Germain. A big feast like the day before, after dinner a comedy, and in the evening they go to bed, and their shirts given by the King and Queen. » Mme de Sévigné insists on all the details: “The King kissed her tenderly when she was in bed, and begged her not to refuse anything to M. le Prince de Conti, and to be gentle and obedient; we believe it was. » Alas it was a disastrous wedding night, they are very young and poorly prepared; the Prince de Conti is brutal and frightens his young wife. Madame de Sévigné finds a very different explanation: “She was so ill on her wedding night because of a misplacement, that we threw her cap over the windmills and we saw a drop…”

Subsequently, the Prince of Conti, with a libertine reputation, abandoned his young wife and the marriage proved sterile. Our princess will also be more attracted to her young brother-in-law, François Louis de Bourbon Conti, who would have become her lover. Change of tone from Madame de Sévigné: “She is as mean as a little asp to her husband. »

He goes to war against the Turks in Hungary, in the service of the King of Poland, with his brother and the Prince of Turenne, which enrages Louis XIV. But when she contracts smallpox in 1685, her fickle husband returns, locks himself in with her to treat her, and is happy to see her healed. But he catches the terrible disease and the princess cannot save him. He died on November 9, 1685.

The king protects the interests of his daughter; he authorizes him to renounce the community, emancipates him, and appoints him an advisor. She will be able to recover her dowry and receive her dower. “His beautiful widow mourned him greatly; she has an income of 100,000 crowns and has received so many marks of the king's friendship and his natural inclination for her that with such help no one doubts that she will be consoled” (Mme de Sévigné).

She is a young and beautiful nineteen-year-old widow who is going to taste the pleasures of celibacy. She was named the Grand Princess of Conti then, after the marriage of her brother-in-law, she became the Dowager Princess of Conti, to differentiate her from her sister-in-law.

Her half-sisters born to Madame de Montespan also had prestigious marriages. One is Madame la Duchess, married to a Bourbon Condé; the other marries the son of Monsieur, brother of the king, and will become Duchess of Chartres, then of Orléans, and finally the wife of the Regent. There will be great rivalry between the king's bastards, caused by the rank of the three princesses, each being superior to the other. Madame la Duchess is superior to the Grand Princess de Conti, and both will be surpassed by their last sister, Françoise-Marie de Bourbon, Duchess of Orléans.

The atmosphere is not always good between these half-sisters. At Versailles, on December 4, 1695, Princess Palatine wrote: “The evening before yesterday, there was a horrible argument at Marly which made me laugh heartily. The Grand Princess de Conti had reproached Madame de Chartres and Madame the Duchess for getting drunk; she called them wine bags. Then the others called her a garbage bag. These are princely disputes…” This is an allusion to the princess’s lovers, numerous bodyguards!

Its beauty is so renowned that in 1685, it disturbed the Doge of Genoa visiting Versailles. Dangeau describes how he looks at her for a long time and with the application. One of the senators said to him: “At least, sir, remember that you are a doge. » In 1698, she was thirty-two years old, and the ambassador of the Sultan of Morocco was so seduced by her beauty during a ball in Saint-Cloud that he began to hope to see his sultan marry the daughter of the greatest king of Europe (the sultan has only 500 concubines and some 1,500 children!). Princess Palatine wrote to Marly on January 21, 1700: “It is not a tale in the least that the King of Morocco asked the Princess of Conti in marriage, but the King responded with a categorical refusal. » This adventure will be taken up in Anne Golon's film: Angélique et le sultan.

Monsignor and Princess de Conti are still very close, they have the same passion for music, and they spend a lot of time together. The Princess of Conti is for Monseigneur his “intimate muse” says Saint-Simon; unfortunately she will later be supplanted by her half-sister Madame la Duchess, whom the Dauphin will find more cheerful, more amusing. Madame la Duchess will take her place after the episode of the Meudon cabal, being linked to Miss Choin, a great friend of Monseigneur. Miss Choin, maid of honor to the Princess de Conti, is not beautiful, she has large, very lively black eyes, she has the art of dressing well, and knows how to please Monseigneur. The Palatine describes it this way: “Small, a large mouth full of rotten teeth that had such a stench that you could smell it at the other end of the room; she had a large throat, which charmed Monseigneur because he beat on it like kettledrums. »

Clermont de Chaste, ensign of the king's gendarmes, shared the love of the Princess de Conti and Miss Choin while playing with the princess; “a letter was intercepted by the King, who was surprised as one can imagine, learning of the loves of the princess, his natural daughter, and the perfidy of the two others. He sent for this princess and showed her the letters. She could not bear this affront, she fell fainting on the King's sofa, and this prince, angry as he was at his daughter's behavior, was moved by her present state: he picked her up, kissed her, and he promised that he would never speak to him about this affair” (the Duke of Saint-Simon).

“The Girl of the Sun”

Like her father, she has a passion for dance, which she practices with talent. When the king stops dancing, his children take over, notably in Le Triomphe de l'Amour by Lully and Quinault, presented at Saint-Germain in 1681, and during the Carnival where we find, as dancers, the Dauphin, the Dauphine, the Princess de Conti, the Count of Vermandois and Miss de Nantes who is eight years old. Benserade is under the spell of the princess: “She is charming, she is divine / She erases all the flowers, even the lilies of her origin. » She is at all the parties; in 1683, on the occasion of Carnival, an engraving published in the Mercure de France shows her presiding over a masquerade in the apartment of the Duke of Bourbon. La Fontaine, seduced by her beauty, pays homage to her in Le songe pour Mme la princesse de Conti: “Everything excels in Conti, Everyone gives her arms / Her presence in all places will always make people say / Here is the daughter of Love / She in has grace and charm. » Still following in his father's footsteps, in 1705 a small impromptu was played at the Marquis de Livry's house, set to music by Gillier Dancourt who celebrates "the daughter of the sun".

The princess loves luxury

The king, very attached to his children, wanted to keep them close to him. He lodged them at Versailles, gave them places in the chapel, and made them participate in certain meals; the princesses lead the balls, run the gaming tables, attend all the receptions and ceremonies; they are on all the trips of the court, of all the Marlys.

When the court was established in Versailles in 1682, the Princess of Conti had a sumptuous apartment which she shared briefly with her husband who died in 1685. She was housed on the ground floor, in the center of the wing of the prince, his sisters at his side. She loves the luxury of mirrors, mirrored cabinets, and the novelty of so-called “French” fireplaces which include a mirror.

Like her father, she furnishes herself with silver furniture, these will be plaques with arms for her cabinet, a large mirror weighing more than twenty kilos, a large chandelier weighing twenty-six kilos, a fireplace surrounded with its andirons weighing twenty -seven kilos, all delivered by Delaunay in May 1682, a total of one hundred and twenty-two kilos of solid silver which will be melted in 1689.

In her house in town, the Hôtel de Conti, built by Mansart, (on the site of the current Versailles town hall), she had “a bathing pavilion” built in 1690. Félibien the judge Magnificent. Dangeau recounts that on Saturday, November 18, 1690, “Monseigneur dined with Madame la Princesse de County, then went to spend the afternoon with her in her pavilion, which she had very well accommodated.” The one that Saint-Simon will call "the cleanest person in the world, and the most sought after in her cleanliness" shows that after Anne of Austria, and Louis XIV, she does not fear water and, made this bathing pavilion, a place of refinement and delight. On August 11, 1698 “Madame the Duchess of Burgundy went at three o'clock to the Hôtel de Conty, where she bathed with all her ladies” (Dangeau). A ceiling removed in 1953, the only survivor of this bathhouse, was very recently restored. This painting can be attributed to Claude III Audran, a painter, who had worked on the remarkable ceiling of the small bedroom of the princess's apartment in the castle. This pavilion of great originality is slightly later than the pavilion of the Marly Baths built for Louis XIV in 1688, considered one of the oldest of its kind.

A modern princess, with new tastes

It was in two areas that she showed herself to be particularly innovative: she had "a theater" set up in the Hôtel de Conti and "a dining room" in her Château de Choisy, well before Madame de Pompadour's theater, and the first dining rooms of the young Louis XV. In 1689, she was widowed, feeling free, and invited to her house in town; snacks were served there in the presence of the king, Monseigneur, and the royal family. Like Monseigneur, she shares with him her passion for opera. She likes to play Italian music in her new theater at the Conti Hotel where only eighty spectators can be present, and where the actors and singers are often family members. Thus Lully's Alceste, the summit of lyrical art, will be performed on January 9, 1700, by the royal family. She likes motets, but she does not want to sing in front of the courtiers and asks the king to bring them out, as Marie-Antoinette did in her time.

In 1716, she bought the Château de Choisy, spent her summers there, and received Peter the Great there. And, big news, she will add a new room at the end of the gallery, a dining room. Louis the View of the Palace of Versailles taken from the Place d'Armes.

Having loved life so much and considered the most affectionate of princesses, she will be greatly missed. She, who watched with all her love for Monseigneur and the king, died on May 3, 1739, at the Hôtel de Lorge in Paris. She is buried in the chapel of the Virgin of the Saint-Roch church in Paris. Very generous in her will, she did not forget any of her servants and made her first cousin Louis César de La Baume Le Blanc, Duke of La Vallière, her universal legatee.