The Creation of the French Royal Mistress

Tracy Adams is Professor of French in the School of Cultures, Languages and Linguistics at the University of Auckland. She is the author of three books, including Christine de Pizan and the Fight for France, also published by Penn State University Press. Christine Adams is Professor of History at St. Marys College of Maryland. She is the author or coeditor of four books, including A Taste for Comfort and Status: A Bourgeois Family in Eighteenth-Century France, also published by Penn State University Press.

Acknowledgments

Introduction: What Was It About France?

1. The Beginning of a Tradition: Agnès Sorel

2. A Tradition Takes Hold: Anne de Pisseleu d’Heilly

3. Diane de Poitiers: Epitome of the French Royal Mistress

4. Gabrielle d’Estrées: Never the Twain Shall Meet

5. The Mistresses of the Sun King: La Vallière, Montespan, Maintenon

6. Tearing the Veil: Pompadour and Du Barry

Epilogue: Mistress-Queen and the End of a Tradition: Marie Antoinette

Notes

Bibliography

Index

“Provides us with a new way of understanding the role of the royal mistress as integral to the workings of the French Crown. Scholars, students, and general readers alike will find much to explore here.”—Bridgette Sheridan, French History

“With this excellent and seamlessly coauthored study, Christine and Tracy Adams delve into the creation of the post of the royal significant other—an often overlooked category of premodern female power and influence. They move beyond the salacious to an intellectual understanding of the complementarity of gendered premodern political power.”—Zita Rohr, author of Yolande of Aragon (1381-1442) Family and Power: The Reverse of the Tapestry

“Intensively researched and engagingly written, this innovative work traces the history of the royal mistress in France, demonstrating her impressive social, political, and cultural influence. The book examines the development of this unique position, which was a counterpart (and rival) to that of the queen—ultimately arguing that Marie Antoinette fell by trying to play the traditional roles of both queen and mistress, rocking the foundations of French queenship and the court itself.”—Elena Woodacre, author of The Queens Regnant of Navarre: Succession, Politics and Partnership, 1274 1512

“At last, a scholarly academic book on French royal mistresses, extensive in its coverage from Agnès Sorel to Du Barry, and one that can be used with confidence in teaching this subject in courses on women in power and the development of courtly politics in the early modern period. A comparative analytical discussion of the uses of ‘soft power’ by nonroyal women at the French court is long overdue.”—Jonathan Spangler, author of The Society of Princes: The Lorraine-Guise and the Conservation of Power and Wealth in Seventeenth-Century France

“The extraordinary position of the ‘official’ mistress (maîtresse en titre) of reigning kings of France—from Agnes Sorel in the fifteenth century to Mesdames de Pompadour and du Barry in the eighteenth—is Christine and Tracy Adams’s focus in this scholarly and illuminating study. They do full justice to the post’s colorful incumbents, who casually broke their age’s gender conventions, but also brilliantly highlight the persistent and multifaceted ways—sexual partner, political adviser, patronage hub, diplomatic back channel, cultural patron, ostentatious fashion adornment—in which these women served the monarchy.”—Colin Jones, author of Madame de Pompadour: Images of a Mistress

“This is a valuable contribution to our knowledge of the French monarchy and the changing roles and relationships of women at the royal court.”—Kathryn Norberg, Renaissance Quarterly