L a - b e a u t é - s a u v e r a - l e - m o n d e ~ D o s t o ï e v s k i

L a - b e a u t é - s a u v e r a - l e - m o n d e  ~  D o s t o ï e v s k i



Sunday, June 19, 2016

Louis III de Bourbon-Condé, duc de Bourbon, duc de Montmorency, duc d'Enghien, 6th prince de Condé, comte de Sancerre, comte de Charolais, seigneur de Chantilly, Prince du sang - unknown artist, circa 1690



Louis de Bourbon (10 November 1668, Paris - 4 March 1710, Versailles), French "Prince of the Blood" and member of the reigning House of Bourbon at the court of Louis XIV. His parents were Henri Jules de Bourbon, duc d'Enghien, and Anne Henriette of Bavaria; he was thus the grandson of le Grand Condé. One of ten children, he was his parents' only surviving son and styled as the duc de Bourbon from birth. He succeeded his father as prince de Condé, only a year before his own death.


In 1685 at the age of seventeen, he was married to Louise Françoise de Bourbon - known at court as mademoiselle de Nantes - the eldest legitimized daughter of Louis XIV and the king's mistress, Madame de Montespan. Many at court were shocked by the proposed union of a full-blooded prince du sang and a royal bastard and, indeed, by the king's ongoing programme of engineering prestigious marriages for his extra-marital offspring. But the head of the House of Condé, le Grand Condé, agreed to the shockingly unequal match in the hope of gaining favor with the bride's father.


Made a chevalier du Saint-Esprit in 1686, a colonel of the Bourbon-Infanterie Regiment later that same year, a maréchal de camp in 1690, and a lieutenant general in 1692, Monsieur le Duc, as he was called at court, and his wife had nine children, all of whom lived well into adulthood. This was rather unusual for the time, and all the more so since their father was never anything like a fine specimen of health or good breeding. Macrocephalic, while not quite a dwarf, he was extremely short, and had a complexion with a markedly yellowish-orange cast to it. Of his parent's ten children, only he and four of his sisters had survived past the age of five, and his sisters were so petite that they were referred to at court as poupées du sang "dolls of the Blood" or, less kindly, as "the little black beetles" because, in addition to their lack of stature, some of them were dark of complexion and/or bent.


Their father, also quite short and considered "repulsive" in appearance had been, in addition, mentally unstable throughout most of his life. Violent, he had frequently beaten his good-natured, sympathetic wife and terrorized his children. It is said that his son and heir also suffered from mental illness toward the end of his life. He died at the age of forty-one, only eleven months after his father, following an attack of apoplexy.




14 comments:

  1. What a shame we don't know the artist. It's quite a fine portrait for all that it's massively inaccurate based on your description of him.

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  2. He was not all that bad looking from the portrait. But the artist could have embellished it.

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    1. I'm pretty darn sure that the artist make a few "improvements"! ; )

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  3. I suppose that by marrying a daughter of Mme. de Montespan, the physical appearance of their offspring must have looked gratly improved.
    La Rochechouart was famous for her beauty, enchanting the King in such a way that for the longest time even Louis XIV forgot he was a womanizer....

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  4. I love your blogs, it's amazing!!!!!

    Look at me
    http://royalisticism.blogspot.com

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    1. Thank you so much, Carlos! I'll definitely check out your blog. : )

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  5. Where is that painting located?

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  6. The portrait is attributed to the School of Hyacinthe Rigaud and resides at Versailles. Also,your sight is amazing, brilliant and informative.

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    1. Thank you so much - and thanks for the information!

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  7. I actually own another version of this painting that was probably done at the same time. It was not unusual at that time that an artist would make more than one copy of a painting. Most likely these painting are from the school of Hyacinthe Rigaud, as reported by mimsdetroit, who was the renowned portrait painter of the aristocrats at Versailles. The painting is quite stunning in real life.

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    1. How wonderful to own a version of this striking painting! Yes, it only made sense to make copies of successful portraits. Rigaud's celebrated state portrait of Louis XIV is a perfect example, as I'm sure you know. Painted for the French king's grandson, the newly created king of Spain, Philip V, le roi soleil was so pleased with the finished painting that he kept it for himself and had Rigaud quickly produce a copy to be sent off to the Spanish court.

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  8. The rumor is that Guilluame Reuame was the illegitimate son of Prince, Louis de Conde. I want the truth.

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