Download or read book The Creation of the French Royal Mistress written by Tracy Adams and published by Penn State University Press. This book was released on 2020 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores the sociogenesis and development of the French royal mistress, examining the careers of nine of the most significant holders of that title between 1444 and the final years of the ancien régime.
Download or read book The Creation of the French Royal Mistress written by Tracy Adams and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2020-03-24 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kings throughout medieval and early modern Europe had extraconjugal sexual partners. Only in France, however, did the royal mistress become a quasi-institutionalized political position. This study explores the emergence and development of the position of French royal mistress through detailed portraits of nine of its most significant incumbents: Agnès Sorel, Anne de Pisseleu d’Heilly, Diane de Poitiers, Gabrielle d’Estrées, Françoise Louise de La Baume Le Blanc, Françoise Athénaïs de Rochechouart de Mortemart, Françoise d’Aubigné, Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, and Jeanne Bécu. Beginning in the fifteenth century, key structures converged to create a space at court for the royal mistress. The first was an idea of gender already in place: that while women were legally inferior to men, they were men’s equals in competence. Because of their legal subordinacy, queens were considered to be the safest regents for their husbands, and, subsequently, the royal mistress was the surest counterpoint to the royal favorite. Second, the Renaissance was a period during which people began to experience space as theatrical. This shift to a theatrical world opened up new ways of imagining political guile, which came to be positively associated with the royal mistress. Still, the role had to be activated by an intelligent, charismatic woman associated with a king who sought women as advisors. The fascinating particulars of each case are covered in the chapters of this book. Thoroughly researched and compellingly narrated, this important study explains why the tradition of a politically powerful royal mistress materialized at the French court, but nowhere else in Europe. It will appeal to anyone interested in the history of the French monarchy, women and royalty, and gender studies.
Download or read book Queens and Mistresses of Renaissance France written by Kathleen Wellman and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2013-05-21 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tells the history of the French Renaissance through the lives of its most prominent queens and mistresses.
Download or read book Agn s Sorel and the French Monarchy written by Tracy Adams and published by ARC Humanities Press. This book was released on 2022-05-31 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first full length study in English to examine the life and the afterlife of Agnès Sorel (1428-1450), a favourite of King Charles VII of France, and first in the long genealogy of French royal mistresses.
Download or read book Royal Mistress written by Anne Easter Smith and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-05-07 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of A Rose for the Crown and Daughter of York comes another engrossing historical novel of the York family in the Wars of the Roses, telling the fascinating story of the rise and fall of the final and favorite mistress of Edward IV. Jane Lambert, the quick-witted and alluring daughter of a silk merchant, is twenty-two and still unmarried. When Jane’s father finally finds her a match, she’s married off to the dull, older silk merchant William Shore. Marriage doesn’t stop Jane from flirtation, however, and when the king’s chamberlain, Will Hastings, comes to her husband’s shop, Will knows King Edward will find her irresistible. Edward IV has everything: power, majestic bearing, superior military leadership, a sensual nature, and charisma. And with Jane as his mistress, he also finds true happiness. But when his hedonistic tendencies get in the way of being the strong leader England needs, his life, as well as those of Jane and Will Hastings, hangs in the balance. Jane must rely on her talents to survive as the new monarch, Richard III, bent on reforming his brother’s licentious court, ascends the throne. This dramatic tale has been an inspiration to poets and playwrights for five hundred years, and, as told through the unique perspective of a woman plucked from obscurity and thrust into a life of notoriety, Royal Mistress is sure to enthrall today’s historical fiction lovers as well.
Download or read book The French Mistress written by Susan Holloway Scott and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2009-07-07 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of The King's Favorite-a new novel based on a dazzling and decadent true story of Restoration England. The daughter of a poor nobleman, Louise leaves the French countryside for the court of King Louis XIV, where she must not only please the tastes of the jaded king, but serve as a spy for France. With few friends, many rivals, and ever-shifting loyalties, Louise learns the perils of her new role. Yet she is too ambitious to be a pawn in the intrigues of others. With the promise of riches, power, and even the love of a king, Louise creates her own destiny in a dance of intrigue between two monarchs-and two countries.
Download or read book Madame de Pompadour written by Christine Pevitt and published by Grove Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This biography of the legendary mistress of King Louis XV offers dramatic insight into the life of one of the most enchanting, powerful, and feared women to grace the world's stage. Groomed from an early age to assume the role of a rich man's mistress, Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson underwent several transformations before she caught the heart of the king himself. Although accustomed to the king's extramarital relationships, the court was shocked at the sudden ascension of the low-born Mademoiselle Poisson. The newcomer, however, wasted no time in establishing herself as the king's sole confidante and, ultimately, his indispensable partner in affairs of state. The critically acclaimed author of Philippe, Duc d'Orleans, Christine Pevitt Algrant traces Madame de Pompadour from her modest beginnings in early-eighteenth-century Paris to her reign as the undisputed mistress of Versailles. Filled with photographs, and evocative and insightful in its telling, Madame de Pompadour is a seductive portrait of one of the most fascinating and influential women of the age.
Download or read book Women and Power at the French Court 1483 1563 written by Susan Broomhall and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Women and Power at the French Court, 1483--1563 explores the ways in which a range of women " as consorts, regents, mistresses, factional power players, attendants at court, or as objects of courtly patronage " wielded power in order to advance individual, familial, and factional agendas at the early sixteenth-century French court. Spring-boarding from the burgeoning scholarship of gender, the political, and power in early modern Europe, the collection provides a perspective from the French court, from the reigns of Charles VIII to Henri II, a time when the French court was a renowned center of culture and at which women played important roles. Crossdisciplinary in its perspectives, these essays by historians, art and literary scholars investigate the dynamic operations of gendered power in political acts, recognized status as queens and regents, ritualized behaviors such as gift-giving, educational coteries, and through social networking, literary and artistic patronage, female authorship, and epistolary strategies.
Download or read book The Mistress of Paris written by Catherine Hewitt and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2017-01-24 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "First published in the United Kingdom by Icon Books Ltd"--Title page verso.
Download or read book The Real Queen of France written by Lisa Hilton and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The resplendent sex symbol of the splendid century'... The reign of Athenais de Montespan as principal mistress of Louis XIV corresponds with the most glorious period of the Grand Siecle. Athenais was 'the true Queen of France', symbol of a dazzling French culture in the seventeenth century. As a lover, she risked the disgrace of double adultery to conduct an affair which scandalized Europe; as a patron she supported many of the leaders of the cultural renaissance including Moliere and Racine; as a mother she is the ancestor of most of the royal houses of Europe. The greatest beauty of her day, Athenais lived her life publicly and sensationally until accusations of witchcraft forced her from power in the 'Affair of the Poisons', a mystery which remains unsolved. She fascinates not only because she achieved power at a time when it was denied to most women, but because she achieved that power through her manipulation of a prescribed role.
Download or read book Royal Mistresses written by Charles Carlton and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-03-31 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1990, Royal Mistresses provides an innovative way of looking at the development of British monarchy, and at the same time investigates the relationship between sex and power. Charles Carlton focuses not so much on the amorous activities of the mistresses of British monarchs as on their influences on those monarchs and on society at large. Ranging from the early medieval period to the late 1990s, he shows that a monarch’s illicit sexual life sheds light on his character and reign. It is no coincidence that Henry I, Charles II, and Edward VII, who were successful with their mistresses were also successful in their reigns, while the divorced John and the lovelorn Edward VIII failed Not surprisingly, the affairs of the sovereign’s heart have very often become the affairs of state. This book will be of interest to students of history and literature.
Download or read book The Wardrobe Mistress written by Meghan Masterson and published by St. Martin's Griffin. This book was released on 2017-08-15 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An RT Book Reviews Top Pick and 2017 RT Reviewers' Choice Best Book Nominee: THE WARDROBE MISTRESS is Meghan Masterson's fascinating and visceral debut, an inside look at Marie Antoinette's luxurious life in Versailles remarkably juxtaposed against life in third estate as the French Revolution gains strength. A propulsive exploration of love, loyalty, danger, and intrigue...not to be missed. It's Giselle Aubry's first time at court in Versailles. At sixteen, she is one of Marie Antoinette's newest undertirewomen, and in awe of the glamorous queen and her opulent palace life. A budding designer, it's a dream come true to work with the beautiful fabrics and jewels in the queen's wardrobe. But every few weeks she returns home to visit her family in Paris where rumors of revolution are growing stronger. From her position working in the royal household, Giselle is poised to see both sides of the revolutionary tensions erupting throughout Paris. When her uncle, a retired member of the secret du roi, a spy ring that worked for the old King, Louis XV, suggests that she casually report the Queen’s actions back to him as a game, she leaps at the chance. Spying seems like an adventure and an exciting way to privately support the revolution taking the countryside by storm. She also enjoys using her insight from Versailles in lively debates with Léon Gauvain, the handsome and idealistic revolutionary who courts her. But as the uprising continues to gain momentum, and Giselle grows closer to the Queen, becoming one of the few trusted servants, she finds herself dangerously torn. Violence is escalating; she must choose where her loyalty truly lies, or risk losing everything...maybe even her head.
Download or read book An Historical and Moral View of the Origin and Progress of the French Revolution written by Mary Wollstonecraft and published by . This book was released on 1794 with total page 550 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Mistress of the Art of Death written by Ariana Franklin and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2007-02-06 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The national bestselling hit hailed by the New York Times as a "vibrant medieval mystery...[it] outdoes the competition." In medieval Cambridge, England, Adelia, a female forensics expert, is summoned by King Henry II to investigate a series of gruesome murders that has wrongly implicated the Jewish population, yielding even more tragic results. As Adelia's investigation takes her behind the closed doors of the country's churches, the killer prepares to strike again.
Download or read book Marie Antoinette s Head written by Will Bashor and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2013-10-16 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Marie Antoinette has remained atop the popular cultural landscape for centuries for the daring in style and fashion that she brought to 18th century France. For the better part of the queen’s reign, one man was entrusted with the sole responsibility of ensuring that her coiffure was at its most ostentatious best. Who was this minister of fashion who wielded such tremendous influence over the queen’s affairs? Winner of the Adele Mellen Prize for Distinguished Scholarship, Marie Antoinette’s Head: The Royal Hairdresser, The Queen, and the Revolution charts the rise of Leonard Autie from humble origins as a country barber in the south of France to the inventor of the Pouf and premier hairdresser to Queen Marie-Antoinette. By unearthing a variety of sources from the 18th and 19th centuries, including memoirs (including Léonard’s own), court documents, and archived periodicals the author, French History professor and expert Will Bashor, tells Autie’s mostly unknown story. Bashor chronicles Leonard’s story, the role he played in the life of his most famous client, and the chaotic and history-making world in which he rose to prominence. Besides his proximity to the queen, Leonard also had a most fascinating life filled with sex (he was the only man in a female dominated court), seduction, intrigue, espionage, theft, exile, treason, and possibly, execution.
Download or read book Strange Revelations written by Lynn Wood Mollenauer and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Affair of the Poisons was the greatest court scandal of the seventeenth century. From 1679 to 1682 the French crown investigated more than 400 people&—including Louis XIV&’s official mistress and members of the highest-ranking circles at court&—for sensational crimes. In Strange Revelations, Lynn Mollenauer brings this bizarre story to life, exposing a criminal magical underworld thriving in the heart of the Sun King&’s capital. The macabre details of the Affair of the Poisons read like a gothic novel. In the fall of 1678, Nicolas de la Reynie, head of the Paris police, uncovered a plot to poison Louis XIV. La Reynie&’s subsequent investigation unveiled a loosely knit community of sorceresses, magicians, and renegade priests who offered for sale an array of services and products ranging from abortions to love magic to poisons known as &“inheritance powders.&” It was the inheritance powders (usually made from powdered toads steeped in arsenic) that lent the Affair of the Poisons its name. The purchasers of the powders gave the affair its notoriety, for the scandal extended into the most exalted ranks of the French court. Mollenauer adroitly uses the Affair of the Poisons to uncover the hidden forms of power that men and women of all social classes invoked to achieve their goals. While the exercise of state power during the ancien r&égime was quintessentially visible&—ritually displayed through public ceremonies&—the affair exposes the simultaneous presence of other imagined and real sources of power available to the Sun King&’s subjects: magic, poison, and the manipulation of sexual passions. Highly entertaining yet deeply researched, Strange Revelations will appeal to anyone interested in the history of court society, gender, magic, or crime in early modern Europe.
Download or read book The Sisters of Versailles written by Sally Christie and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2015-09 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Court intriguers are beginning to sense that young King Louis XV, after seven years of marriage, is tiring of his Polish wife. The race is on to find a mistress for the royal bed. The King's scheming ministers push Louise, the eldest of the aristocratic Nesle sisters, into the arms of the King. Over the following decade, of the five Nesle sisters-- Louise, Pauline, Diane, Hortense, and Marie-Anne-- four will become mistresses to King Louis XV. All will conspire, betray, suffer, and triumph in a desperate fight for both love and power.
