Sunday, August 16, 2020

French Queens--

531-572 
Queen of Austrasia

Also known as:
Vuldetrade
Vultrade
Vuldetrada.

Daughter of: King Wacho of the Lombards & Wisigard of the Gepids, also known as Austrigusa, Ostrogotha.

Wife of:
1) Theodebald I of Austrasia (d.555) mar 554
2) Lothaire II de France (497-561) mar 555, rep
3) Garibald I of Bavaria (540-591) mar after

"Yet in her own time, Waldrada was a powerful woman, who led an exciting and eventful life. The concubine of a Frankish king, Lothar II, she became his wife in 862, and participated for a while in the full theatre of medieval queenship. But in 863 the pope forbade the marriage, and forced them to separate. Even so, he thought that she was still holding the reins of power, and accused her of plotting the death of her rival, the king’s ‘other’ wife Theutberga. In the face of this papal onslaught (which included excommunication), King Lothar stuck by Waldrada so doggedly that some observers concluded that she was practising witchcraft, capable of inflaming him to lust merely by showing him enchanted clothing." (Waldrada @Turbulent Priests)

Her lover was.
File:Lothair II of Lotharingia.jpg
Lothaire II of Lotharingia
@Wikipedia

" . . . Almost at once Nicholas faced a serious problem in one of the Frankish kingdoms. The emperor's brother, King Lothair II of Lotharingia (or Lorraine) . . . , renounced his queen, Theutberga, claiming that she had committed incest with her own brother and then aborted the foetus conceived of their coitus. She was banished to a nunnery, and the king married his lover, Waldrada, who had borne him a son. . . ." (A History of the Church in the Middle Ages: 86)
CHILPERIC 1er ET FREDEGONDE.jpg
Chilperic I & Fredegonde
@Wikipedia
(545-596)
"One subject fitted in easily with this violent clan. She came from a family of low rank and had worked as a servant to Queen Audovera, wife to King Chilperic of Neustria, a Merovingian kingdom in what is now northern France. Whether or not Fredegund did anything to invite his attentions, Chilperic quickly fell deeply in love or lust with her. Not content with having Fredegund as another of his mistresses, Chilperic waited for a way to get rid of his distracting wife. When Audovera broke canon law by not having a godmother to hold her newborn daughter after her baptism, Chilperic used this little incident as an excuse to divorce Audovera and exile her to a convent. Yet, as far as Fredegund was concerned, this was not enough to ensure her grip on Chilperic. Sometime after becoming Chilperic's new bride, Fredegund sent an assassin to murder Audivera in the haven of the nunnery itself. Audovera and Chilperic's daughter Basina was also later condemed to the holy life, but fortunately Basina did not share her unlucky mother's ultimate fate." (Ruthless Rulers: The Real Lives of Europe's Most Infamous Tyrants)

Her lovers were:
1) King Chilperic of Soissons.
" . . . Audouere, the first wife of Chilperic, king of Soissons, had in her service a lady named Fredegonde, who, by her talent and intrigues, first became the confidant of her mistress, then the mistress of her master, and finally aspired to be his wife. The divorce of Audouere was brought about by an ingenious plot. . . ." (The Marriage of Near Kin Considered with Respect to the Laws of Nations: 118)

From Servant to Queen: ". . . Fredegund was a low-born servant who started her career as King Chilperic's mistress and ended as queen of Neustria.  Although she is accused of ordering the assassination of Galswintha, Brunhild's sister, there is no evidence that she instigated the murder.  After her husband's death, she functioned as regent for her surviving son, the future king Clothar II." (Women and Gender in Medieval Europe: An Encyclopedia: 96)

Mayor of the Palace to Chlothar II, 604-613.

" . . . Queen Fredegund was beautiful, very cunning, and an adulteress. At the time Landeric was mayor of the Palace. a clever and warlike man, whom the said queen loved a great deal, for he took pleasure in having intercourse with her. . . ." (From Roman to Merovingian Gaul: A Reader)

"Fredegund had taken the Mayor of the Palace, Landeric, as her lover. This arrangement went on well enough right under Chilperic's nose, until one day Chilperic snuck up behind Fredegund and playfully whacked her on the bottom. Perhaps not expecting to see her husband that day, she instinctively replied, 'Why do you do this, Landeric?' Instantly realizing the truth, the king went off to his daily hunt without a word, probably to contemplate what to do with the treasonous lovers. A panicked Fredegund ran to Landeric and together they got a couple of Landeric's men drunk and encouraged them to to out to kill the king on the pretext of some private grievance. Taking Chilperic off-guard during his hunt, they managed to stab him to death and Brunhilde's son, who had become King Childebert II of Austrasia, got the blame for it." (Ruthless Rulers)

" . . . Having taken to herself a new lover in the person of Landerik, she had Hilperik put to death. . . ." (The New Monthly Magazine: 235). 

" . . . Fredegonde, whose private life is said to have been as licentious as her public behaviour was tyrannic and sanguinary. Her favourite lover at this time was the count of the palace, Landeric. One day, we are told, the king, who was residing at his villa at Chelles, about five leagues from Paris, was preparing to depart on a hunting excursion. Before taking horse, he went hurriedly to the chamber of Fredegonde to seek something which he head forgotten, and finding the queen stooped over a basin of water in which she was washing her face, he struck her behind playfully and familiarly with a small rod or wand he carried in his hand. 'What art thou doing now, Landeric?' cried the queen without raising her head. The king, with evident marks of astonishment and anger, left the room hastily, mounted his horse, and proceeded to the woods; while the queen, aware of her danger, consulted with Landeric and formed a plan for assassinating the king on his return. . . ." (The History of France, Vol 1: 69)

" . . . Landeric was no 'mere' courtier. As the vita makes clear, he was a vir inluster and Chlothar's mayor of the palace. Vir inluster was originally a Roman title; in Late Antiquity it was awarded only to men who had held the very highest imperial offices, and by the fifth century it clearly designated 'an inner aristocracy' within the aristocracy. But as we have already seen it was also an exclusive Merovingian honorific, and it may not have struck a Merovingian reader as 'Roman' at all, not nearly so Roman as, say, the antiquated de genere senatorum would have sounded. Consequently Gaugeric's hagiographer may not have meant to heighten Gaugeric's 'Roman' credentials specifically to match him against Landeric's title. But what the vita does make clear, by the vir inluster honorific but also by pointing out that Landeric was the mayor of the palace, is that Gaugeric chose to challenge a very important person -- on Landeric's 'home turf' no less. . . ." (Transformations of Romanness: Early Medieval Regions and Identities: 319)

"Chelles was a royal residence, so as mayor Landeric would have known it well. Maybe too well: the Liber historiae Francorum, which was completed in 727, reports that the mayor was the lover of Fredegund (Chlotar's mother), and when the queen let slip to her husband, Chilperic (561-584), that she was sexually intimate with Landeric, she and the mayor arranged to have the king murdered in order to avoid being punished themselves. This vividly written episode also takes place at Chelles. . . ."  (Transformations of Romanness: 319)

(1100-1154)

Also known as:
Adelaide de Maurienne.


Wife of:
1. Louis VI de France (1/mar 1115)
2. Mathieu I de Montmorency, Constable of France (2/mar 1141)

" . . . Adelaide, born in Savoy about the year 1092, was among France's most powerful and visible queen consorts, exercising the privileges of sovereignty to a degree unprecedented in Capetian history. She was also the mother of seven living sons and a daughter. . . ." (Capetian Women: 28)

" . .  Her French counterpart, while still beautiful, is on the verge of becoming a crone. Beyond the age of childbearing, Adelaide lusts after younger men. She is vengeful, plotting, spiteful, and willing to commit murder if she cannot have what her heart desires. . . ."  (Capetian Women: 29)

Her lover was:
Jeanne II of Burgundy
@Wikipedia
(1292-1330)
". . . The Tour de Nesle, enclosed in the walls of Philippe Auguste, was part of a hotel which belonged to Amauri de Nesle, who sold it to Philippe le Bel in 1308. Jeanne de Bourgogne, wife of Philippe le Long, always lived in the Hotel de Nesle during the eight years of her widowhood.  Her being the heiress of Franche Comte had caused her to be acquitted and reconciled to her husband after she was accused of adultery together with the two daughters-in-law of Philippe de Bel, though the Princesses Blanche and Marguerite were imprisoned for life, and their supposed lovers, Philippe and Gautier d'Aulnoi, beheaded, after the most cruel tortures. . . ." (Paris: 400)

Wife of: Louis VI de France (1881-1137), King of the Franks 1108


Her lovers were:
Gautier d'Aulnay (1288-1314)
Seigneur de Moussy-Le-Neuf et Grand-Moulin
Norman knight

Son of: Gauthier V d'Aulnay

The Tower of Nesle Affair.
"The Tour de Nesle Affair was a scandal amongst the French royal family in 1314, during which the three daughters-in-law of King Philip IV of France were accused of adultery, the accusations apparently started by Philip's only daughter, Isabella, Queen of England. The Tour de Nesle was a tower in Paris where much of the adultery was said to have occurred. The scandal led to torture, executions and imprisonments, with lasting consequences for the final years of the Capetian dynasty." (Wikipedia)

"The three sons of Philippe le Bel were married to three ladies, among the most high-born in Europe, mere girls in age, and of extraordinary beauty. There three young persons, Marguerite, Jeanne, and Blanche the sister of the latter, on coming suddenly into the full blaze of the most dissipated court in Europe, allowed themselves to be dazzled and bewildered. There was nothing in the character of the three princes to engage the affections of their youthful spouses. Louis, the husband of Marguerite, afterwards surnamed Le Hutin, was of a cold, stern, and pitiless nature; Charles, the lord of Blanche, was a tranquil and philosophical personage, who, knowing the manners of the age, came to the conclusion, that his partner Jeanne could not possibly conduct herself worse than the other ladies of the court. The three princesses, if we may believe the historians, loved and were beloved. Jeanne, after a year's confinement, was tried by the parliament, and acquitted, and afterwards became Queen of France; while Marguerite and Blanche, were imprisoned in the Chateau Gaillard. Their lovers, Philippe and Gautier d'Aulnay, two Norman brothers, with circumstances of horrible barbarity. There were first skinned alive, then mutilated and beheaded, and their bodies hung up by the shoulders on the common gibbet. The usher of the chamber, who had been privy to their fatal loves, was hung beside them; and many of the lords who were most attached to the criminals were put to horrible tortures, on pretext of eliciting a confession, while others were secretly drowned in the night." (Wanderings by the Seine from Rouen to the Source: 56-57)

The punishment of the Aulnay brothers.
"Gautier and Philippe had threatened the King’s bloodline and could be spared no suffering. This was the middle ages when torturers had plenty of practise. The Knights were interrogated viciously until they admitted their guilt. Then the horror really began. Both were strapped to and broken on the wheel. Before they passed out in pain they were castrated, slowly, and their ‘parts’ thrown to the dogs. Next each had boiling lead and sulphur applied liberally. The experienced torturer would know how to keep them just alive and awake before adding another dollop. But the brothers were probably past all caring when the torturer started to cut off their heads. After which the decapitated bodies were dragged through the city of Paris, hung on the public gallows, skinned and left. For weeks. A chronicler at the time did not exaggerate when he stated ‘never have bodies suffered so much’." (An old story of youth, betrayal and terror @(Normandy Then and Now)
Chateau Gaillard
("Saucy Castle") 
"As for the young princesses, they lived together for a year in the Chateau Gaillard, and on the summit of that dreadful and secluded rock, formed a friendship far closer and more lasting than they could have done in the crowd and gaiety of the world. We have few facts to assist us in speculating upon their characters, but these few are touching in the extreme, and yet have been passed over without observation even by those writers who appear most interested in their fate.

"A year after their imprisonment commenced, the solitude of these sisters in guilt and misery was broken in upon by messengers from the king. The men, perhaps, were moved by the youth and beauty of the captives; perhaps they paused in confusion; perhaps they disclosed the nature of their commission slowly and hesitatingly; or, perhaps, to conceal their shame and almost terror, thundered it forth with the abrupt and discordant voice of the raven. Death! Death!---this was their errand. The young women rushed into one another's arms; they clung round one another's neck; they gazed into one another's eyes. They were ready to die, so that they died together.

But his was not in the bond. Marguerite was torn from the arms of Blanche; and the latter consoled with the information that she was not to die. Consoled! They held held her with difficulty, young, frail, and fragile as she was; for friendship in woman, that rarest of her qualities, partaking of the enthusiasm of her nature, resembles a passion. She saw her beautiful and beloved friend in the grasp of the ruffians; she saw them unbuckle the tangles of her long hair, and twist them round her queenly neck. And she---she could but write the while in the arms that withheld her, till her blood sprang from beneath the gauntlets; she could but pray and curse by turns, now invoking a miracle, now blasphemously reproaching the cold unheeding heavens; she could but scream, till her voice startled the fishermen far below on the placid waters of the Seine. It was at length over. The face of Marguerite, turned towards her to the last, became black; her limbs were convulsed---she was dead!" (Wanderings by the Seine from Rouen to the Source: 57-58)

Aftermath: "Blanche was now completely alone in the cold and the dark. It won’t be a surprise to learn that records of Blanche’s life at Château Gaillard reveal a long draw out horror. Just out of her teens and used to a life of money and style, this soft silly child did not have a survivor’s strength. Would any of us? Her suffering was approved of by the King so it is no surprise that she was repeatedly debased. Disregarded. Damaged. Blanche’s mother Mathilda sent gifts Blanche never saw. Mathilda never visited. It took eight years, until her own husband became King of France, for Blanche to be released. He did not release her out of pity, he finally managed to annul their marriage. He had Blanche sent to the furthest corners of the Manche to Château Gavray (not to an abbey as is widely reported) while he married again. If the caretakers at Gavray expected a proud princess at their gates they were in for a surprise. For after many years of underground torment Blanche, not yet 30, was grey, ugly, frail. She was dead with the year." (The Sad Secret of Chateau Gaillard @ Normandy Then and Now)
Bonne of Bohemia
@Wikipedia
(1315-1349)
Queen of France

Duchesse de Normandie
Comtesse d'Anjou & Maine

Also known as:
Bonne de Luxembourg
Jutta of Luxemburg.

Daughter of: Jan the Blind of Bohemia & Elisabeth of Bohemia

Her lover was:
Raoul II de Brienne, Comte d'Eu. (1315-1350)
Constable de France

Son of: Raoul I de Brienne, Comte d'Eu & Jeanne de Mello.

Husband of: Catherine de Savoie (d.1388), mar 1340.

" . . . It was rumored that discovery of queenly adultery had been behind the death of Bonne, wife of the future John II (of France), in 1349, and the execution of her supposed lover, the Count of Eu, in 1350. . . ." (Zane)

"The reign of Jean II did not begin auspiciously. In mid-November 1350, when the constable Raoul de Brienne, count of Eu, came to Paris for the purpose of his ransom -- he had been a prisoner of the English since his capture at Caen in July 1346 -- the king had him arrested. On the night of 18-19 November he was summarily executed in the prison of the hotel of Nesle. The reasons for his death are obscure. The official chronicler of Jean II and Charles V spoke only of his 'very great and evil treasons'; Jean Le Bel suggested that Eu had once had an affair with the queen; and Raymond Cazelles argued that Eu was executed because he had been acting as an intermediary between the Savoyards and the English. It still seems most likely that Eu's treason was his intention to obtain his liberty from the English by selling to them the county and fortress of Guines that were strategically so important to them. Whatever the reason, Eu's execution was cause for much grumbling, particularly in Normandy, where the count had held extensive property. This restiveness was certainly aggravated by the fact that Jean II chose to remain silent on the matter." (Cuttler: 154)

Reference:
Guillaume de Machaut: A Guide to Research
File:Christine de Pisan and Queen Isabeau detail.jpg

(1370-1435)

Isabella's lovers were:
1) Jean Louvet (1370-?)
" . . . Then there was Jean Louvet, president of Provence. Born around 1370, he became president of the chambre de comptes in Aix in 1415 and a favourite of Isabella of Bavaria, with whom his name was associated as a lover. His connections with the court of France were further cemented by the betrothal of his daughter Marie to Jean, count of Dunois, bastard of Orleans. . . ." (Charles the Seventh: 23)
Louis I of Orleans
@Wikipedia
2) Louis I d'Orleans (1372-1407)
"While the king drew appeasing comfort from the visits of the Duchess of Orleans, the queen threw herself into the arms of the Duke of Orleans. Charles's younger brother. Louis d'Orleans, rakish, handsome, and witty, was a notorious ladies' man and gambler and was widely criticized for his outrageous expenses of tens of thousands of gold francs a day. His dining room walls were hung with dozens of portraits of his past and present mistresses, and it gave the boorish duke the greatest pleasure to invite the ladies' husbands to din with him there. An experienced voluptuary, Louis was the epitome of licentiousness, and the silly queen adopted his ways witn unbridled enthusiasm." (Victorious Charles: 20)

"The queen did not try to hide her affair with the Duke of Orleans; if anything she flaunted it, joining him in his dissolute existence and openly favoring his ambitions to rule. He had the good looks and charm of his brother; although intelligent, he had lost his sense of judgment in his lust for power. Taking full advantage of the king's dementia, Orleans added to his possessions, which were manifold. Besides the county of Asti in Italy, which had come to him thorough his wife's dowry, the Duchies of Luxembourg and Orleans were his, as were the counties of Perigord, Angouleme, Blois, Dreux, Soissons, and other counties and innumerable seigneuries." (Victorious Charles: 22)

". . . Isabeau remained initially neutral in the rivalry between her brother-in-law, Louis, Duke of Orleans, and his cousin John the Fearless, duke of Burgundy. In 1405, Burgundy's ambition drove the queen closer to Orleans, with whom she plotted to kidnap the dauphin from Burgundy's influence. The plan failed, and the queen's association with Orleans led to rumors that she and the duke were lovers." (Encyclopedia of the Hundred Years War: 166)

"Henry's [IV of France] competition for the most grand rascal was Louis, Duke of Orleans, the father of the famous Dunois. He was the lover of the queen, his sister-in-law, and was assassinated while leaving her chambers in 1407. It was probably a political assassination but he had so many love affairs, it could have been any one of a group of thousands. One of the more colorful stories which reveals his true character occurred in the bedroom of his apartments in Paris. He was in bed with the wife of one of his friends. The friend came to pay a visit to the Duke that he found in bed with a lady. The Duke covered the face of the lady (his friend's wife) and left the rest of her all nude. He offered his friend the opportunity to touch and observe this beautiful body as long as he did not remove the cover from her face. His friend, not recognizing his own wife, was so impressed with that he saw that he could not stop himself from relating the events to her the following day. He concluded his tale by telling her that the nude lady was the most beautiful woman that he had ever seen but he had no idea who she was. Many historians believe that this lady was queen Isabeau herself and the true mother of Jean le Dunois, the Bastard of Orleans. Who else could walk into the bedroom of the Duke unannounced than his brother the king, Charles VI." (L' Esprit Du Chemin)

Finding emotional & sexual satisfaction in the queen's lover.
"Because of his poor health, Charles was able to rule only sporadically and was always assisted or replaced temporarily by a council of regents. Among the latter Louis of Orleans, brother of the king, was the most ambitious. He assumed Philip the Bold's position as the chief power behind the throne upon Philip's death in 1404. And he had already increased his influence by making the queen, Isabela of Bavaria, his mistress. Isabela had also been afflicted by the king's illnesses, neglected both emotionally and sexually. Her highly unstable husband was unable, most of the time, to act normally as either husband or political leader. The fact that Isabela and Louis of Orleans became lovers would not have unduly shocked their contemporaries, for their affair was by no means unique. But the consequences of the affair on their collaboration on the political level soon made them extremely unpopular with the Parisian public. . . ." (The Promised Lands: 37)

"At two o'clock on the morning of 22 February 1403 a male child was born to Isabella of Bavaria, queen of France. The boy was born in the royal hotel of St-Pol in Paris, and was the eleventh in the long succession of Isabella's children. Whether or not the child, named Charles after her husband Charles VI, was in fact the king's son has been a matter of fruitless dispute. The extra-marital activities of Isabella were well known. Her liaison with Louis, duke of Orleans, led to scandalous gossip in Paris. There is absolutely no concrete evidence to suggest that Charles was not the king's son; even his own alleged doubts as to his legitimacy can be interpreted in the light of hte cruel act of policy by which he was disinherited bu Charles VI in January 1421. There is little in his early years to arouse the suspicion which was allegendly to haunt him as dauphin. Yet the possibility of his illegitimacy can never be entirely ruled out, and his own son, the future Louis XI, was sufficiently uncertain of the fact to remark that Charles 'did not know whose child he was.' Whatever the facts of his birth may have been, there was no doubt at that time that he stood third in the line of succession to the throne. His two elder brothers, Louis, duke of Guyenne (born in 1497), and Jean, duke of Touraine (born in 1398), both stood ahead o him. He was never really intended to be king. The death of Louis in December 1415 and of Jean in April 1417 left Charles as sole surviving son of the mad Charles VI. His title of dauphin was acccepted by some of his father's subjects. Others preferred to give their support to another claimant to the French throne -- Henry V of England." (Charles the Seventh: 21)

3) Louis de Boisbourdon.
"Surrounded by a court, the members of which had been chosen solely on account of the reputation they possessed for gallantry, the profligate queen passed, at this juncture, a careless and voluptuous life in the Castle of Vincennes. She was suspected, and, it is said, not on slight grounds, of cherishing a criminal affection for her youthful grand-chamberlain, Louis de Bois-Bourdon, one of the bravest knights in the ranks of French chivalry. The constable, who had caused Isabel's every action to be watched by hired spies, had the boldness to open the eyes of the unfortunate monarch, and stimulate him to vengeance. Charles hurried to Vincennes with all speed, in order to surprise his unfaithful consort and seize upon the person of her minion. Bois-Bourdon was first secured, and, afterwards, being put to the torture, confessed everything. He was flung into the Seine during the night, enveloped in a leather sack bearing this inscription" 'Laissez passer la justice du roi.' . . . ." (The Court Magazine and Belle Assemblee: 10)

" . . . In 1417 King Charles had briefly recovered his wits, whereupon the late Count Bernard of Armagnac had informed him that his consort was sleeping with the young Sieur Louis de Boisbourdon; the king immediately had Boisbourdon arrested, horribly tortured, tied in a sack and thrown into the Seine to drown, while imprisoning his erring wife at Tours under a penitential regime. . . ." (The Warrior King and the Invasion of France)

 . . . Louis de Boisbourdon was tortured, and flung into the river.... The queen's amour with the young officer, Louis de Boisbourdon, becoming suspected, he was seized, loaded with chains, subjected to the torture, forced to confess his crime, thrown into the Seine at night, fastened in a leather sack bearing this inscription : - 'Make easy for the king's justice. . . ." (World-noted women: 181)

" . . . The queen, Isabeau, was openly dissolute; on one occasion, the king, returning from visiting her at Vincennes, encountered her lover, the chevalier Louis de Bois-Bourdon, had him arrested on the spot, put to the question,sawed up in a sack, and thrown in the river. . . ." (Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day: 68)
Marie de' Medici
Queen-Regent of France

(1575-1642)
Reine de France
Queen-Regent of France 1610.

Daughter of: Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany & Johanna von Osterreich.

Wife of: Henri IV de France, mar 1600
Marie de' Medici
Concino Concini
Marquis d'Ancre
@ Louvre Museum
Her lover was:
Concino Concini (1575-1617)
Marquis of Ancre, Marshal of France

Husband of: Leonora Dori.

"Linked with the Queen-Mother was her paramour, the Florentine Concini. This swaggering adventurer had come to Court years before, with nothing but a handsome face and unlimited impudence to commend him. His swarthy beauty so impressed Marie de Medici that she married him to her waiting woman, Leonore Galigai, in order to have an excuse for keeping him at Court. Even during the life-time of her husband she had succumbed to his charms. After Henry's murder Concini became King in all but name. He was raised to the peerage with the title of the Marquis d'Ancre and loaded with gifts. Marie de Rohan came to the Louvre to find him the most influential man in the kingdom and fabulously wealthy. While his wife occupied rooms high up under the caves, Concini was installed in a pavilion within the palace grounds. It was an arrangement combining accessibility with discretion. Marie de Medici and her favourite ruled with a high hand and their policy reduced the country to a state of chaos. The Huguenots were in revolt against the Spanish alliance. the nobles were in revolt against a government in which they saw no profit for themselves. With mounting rage they saw honours, titles, gifts showered on a low-born Italian adventurer while they were ignored. Concini's own ill-advised insolence added fuel to the fire. He ruffled about the Court, insulting everyone of consequence, and insisted on being treated with almost royal honours. He was so ready to resent fancied slights that a contemporary wrote, 'If you but lay a hand on this mountain it smokes.' Marie de Medici, besotted by his many beauty and plausible tongue, could refuse him nothing. Only on one occasion did he fail to get his own way and that was when he came into collision with Hercule de Rohan, Duke de Montbazon. Annoyed at being refused some honour that had been promised to the Duke by the late King, Concini brought suit against him on some trumped-up charge. The Queen-Mother, in a lucid moment, hesitated to antagonize Montbazon who was one of the few nobles on whose loyalty she could rely. On the advice of a young and promising member of her council. Armand Duplessis de Richelieu, she ordered Concini to drop the suit. . . ." (The Intriguing Duchess: 20)

" . . . Maria de' Medici increasingly came to rely on the counsel of her childhood companion and mistress of the wardrobe, Leonora Galigai, and her husband, an immeasurably ambitious Concino Concini. Concini's rise to power was meteoric, amassing a sting of offices at court and in the provinces, a marquess' title and a vast fortune along the ay. The Marshal of Ancre -- as he came to be known -- steered the Queen Mother towards more forceful policies. The ageing ministers who lingered from the previous reign were unceremoniously replaced by a batch of talented youngsters who were beholden to the favourite. . . The Concini couple were despised by courtiers and reviled by Parisians. Not even the king was exempt from their greed and contemptuous manners. Only the favour of the Queen Mother kept them in power. . . When Concini entered the Louvre on 24 April 1617, he was apprehended for treason and shot upon the slightest sign of resistance. The following day the Parisian mob pillaged his residence, disinterred his hastily buried body, then maimed and burnt it, and scattered the ashes. His widow was arrested, condemned for treason and witchcraft, and beheaded. Her remains were likewise burnt and scattered. The goods of the Concini were seized and some of the spoils were given to Luynes, who joined in the obliteration of the memory of the Concini by changing the name of the marquisate and village of Ancre into Albert. . . ." (Dynasty and Piety: 448)

(1638-1683)
Her lover was:
Nabo.
" . . . His wife, Queen Marie Theresa of Spain, was to pay him back in his own coin when she took an African lover, Nabo, with serious consequences. . . The case of Marie Theresa . . . caused the most concern. It became one of the best-known scandals to travel down through the sixteenth, seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries' lanes of history, and to find exposure even in the remaining few years of the twentieth century. . . ." (Sertima: 141)

(1755-1793)
She wore the Crown of France by the right of her beauty: "Madame was tall and dark, with black arched eyebrows: there was something hard in her countenance and haughty in her demeanour. . . But, above and beyond all, the young Dauphiness shone with a radiant lustre. A future queen by the right of her marriage, she already wore the crown by right of her beauty. 'Let us picture to ourselves a dazzlingly fair complexion, in which the tints of the earliest summer roses are blended; large, prominent eyes of azure blue; a forehead crowned with luxuriant fair hair; beating the impress of majesty and frankness, gave the noblest expression to her whole countenance. This was enhanced by the perfect shape of her nose. The only defect in the face of the lovely Princess was the slight protrusion of the lower lip; but this was a distinctive feature of the house of Austria, and reminded all that she was the daughter of Maria Theresa. Her figure was shapely and tall for her age; her neck and bust were perfect; her hands beautiful; her feet and legs worthy of the Venus de Medicis. Her movements were easy and graceful, her whole person was delightfully harmonious, so that none could behold her without admiration, because she always desired to please all whom she saw.'" (A Friend of the Queen: 13)

"These details justify the eulogium of the writer; but according to contemporaries the general aspect of the Princess deserved even greater admiration. Count Tilly, who was one of her pages, sums up the common impression. He writes:---"She had that which is of higher prince upon the throne than perfect beauty, the face of a Queen of France, even at those moments in which she sought to appear only as a pretty woman. She had two ways of walking---one was firm, rather quick; and always noble; the other more leisurely and balanced---I might almost say it was a caressing movement, but it never tempted any to forgetfulness of respect. Never did woman curtsey with such grace, saluting ten persons by one bend of her body, and giving each his or her share by the movement of her head and eyes. In a word, it would have come as naturally to every man to bring forward a throne for her as to offer a chair to any other woman.'" (A Friend of the Queen: 15)

Physical appearance & personal qualities.
"The Austrian beauty and the handsome Swede were only nineteen, a few months apart in age, in reality, both inexperienced children, fortunately without an inkling of the terrible fates awaiting them. Marie Antoinette seemed to Fersen even more dazzling than he had expected after Creutz's panegyric---a faultless complexion, a touch of gold in her luxurious fair hair, large azure blue eyes, a perfect figure, beautifully modeled arms, bust, and neck, and hands whose beauty could not fail to remark as he respectfully bent low to kiss one." (Gade: 256)

Marrie Antoinette's alleged lovers were:
1) Axel von Fersen (1755-1810).
Swedish nobleman& diplomat
French Officer.

2) Edouard Dillon (1750-1839)
French military officer & diplomat.

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