In the winter of 1666, King Louis XIV of France began paying attention to a new lady at court. She was Françoise-Athénaïs de Rochechouart, the Marquise de Montespan, a married woman of striking beauty and sharp wit. Within months, she had displaced the king’s official mistress, and by the summer of 1667 she had taken her place at his side. To many at Versailles, she became known as the true queen of France.
But the woman who held the heart of the most powerful monarch in Europe carried a secret that, when it finally surfaced, would nearly destroy her. Françoise was born on 5 October 1640 into two of the oldest noble families in France. Her father was Gabriel de Rochechouart, Duke of Mortemart and Prince of Tonnay-Charente, and her mother was Diane de Grandseigne, a lady-in-waiting to Anne of Austria, the queen mother. Her parents were busy at court, so young Françoise remained at the family château in the west of France, educated by tutors.
At twelve she was sent to a convent school, where she spent five years learning to read, write, some mathematics, and above all religion and manners. She was known as a devout girl and continued to attend mass and take communion regularly into her young adulthood. She left school in 1658, and two years later, at age twenty, became a maid of honor to Princess Henrietta Anne of England, the wife of Louis XIV’s brother. The position came through her mother’s influence and her family’s high standing.
In 1661 she became engaged to Louis-Alexandre de La Trémoille, but the match collapsed when he was forced to flee France for his role in a duel that left a man dead. Soon afterward, Françoise met Louis-Henri de Pardaillan, the younger brother of the man killed in that duel. They fell in love and married in January 1663. She was now Madame de Montespan.
The marriage produced two children quickly, but it was not a happy one. Her husband was an impulsive gambler with a spendthrift habit, and the family fell into financial trouble. They lived near the Louvre, where she carried out her duties as a lady-in-waiting to the Duchess of Orleans. At court she was admired for her beauty, her excellent features, and her extraordinary ability as a conversationalist.
Her wit and charm drew many suitors, despite her marriage, and she soon attracted the attention of the king himself. It is unclear which of them pursued the other, but both appeared interested in an intimate liaison. The first signs of an affair emerged in the winter of 1666, and by May 1667 the two were seen alone together. At that time, Louis’s official mistress was Louise de La Vallière, a position Montespan wanted for herself.
Although La Vallière knew of Montespan’s intentions, she believed the king’s heart was hers and laughed off her rival’s efforts. It was a fatal miscalculation. Both La Vallière and Queen Maria Theresa were pregnant at the time, and they asked Montespan to entertain the king during private dinners. They thought they had befriended her, but they had simply handed their rival the opportunity she needed.
In one well-known incident, Montespan noticed the king spying on her while she washed. She is said to have dropped her towel, allowing him to feast his eyes. After that, Louis was no longer interested in La Vallière, though he kept her around for a time to conceal the new relationship, even moving both women into connected rooms they had to share. La Vallière lingered at court a few more years, then left for a convent after losing her position for good.
Montespan’s beauty and charm may not have been the only tools she used. During the interrogation of witnesses in what became known as the Affair of the Poisons, numerous testimonies claimed that around 1665 Madame de Montespan began visiting a witch and fortune-teller named Catherine Monvoisin, known as La Voisin. La Voisin was a notorious underworld figure who offered services ranging from fortune-telling to abortions to poison. According to these accounts, Montespan used aphrodisiacs on the king, seduced him, and participated in black masses to win and keep his heart.
The alleged rituals were described in detail: a black velvet cloth spread over an altar, the royal mistress lying naked upon it, black candles lit, a celebrant in a robe embroidered with silver characters, and an infant held over the altar, its throat cut so that blood dripped into a chalice and fell upon the woman below. The body was then handed to La Voisin, who threw it into a white-hot oven. Although there was extensive testimony, no conclusive evidence ever linked Montespan to La Voisin or to these ceremonies. Whatever the truth of the allegations, Madame de Montespan became the king’s official mistress in July 1667.
Her husband, serving in the army, remained ignorant of the affair until June 1668, when he learned his wife was pregnant with the king’s child. Enraged, Louis-Henri had his carriage painted black, declaring he was mourning the disappearance of his wife. The king briefly imprisoned him and then exiled him to the southwest of France. He was allowed to return to the army the following year, but after abducting a girl and attacking citizens with his men, he fled to Spain.
The couple was not officially separated until 1674. In 1669, Montespan gave birth to her first child with the king. In time, the pair would have seven children in all. In 1673, Louis XIV legitimized their three living children and gave them the royal surname.
Montespan was too busy at court to raise them, so they spent their childhoods with their governess, Madame Scarron, who was also Montespan’s close friend. Her adultery with the king made her an enemy of the Roman Catholic Church. In 1675, when she asked a priest for penance before Easter communion, he refused her absolution, saying, “Is this the Madame who scandalizes all France? Go abandon your shocking life, and then come throw yourself at the feet of the ministers of Jesus Christ.
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For years, Montespan wielded enormous influence at court, called by some the true queen of France. Her reign ended abruptly in 1677, when she was drawn into the biggest scandal of the decade. The Affair of the Poisons, an extensive investigation into a network of poisoners and witches, led to La Voisin’s arrest. She was interrogated, and to keep her talking, her captors kept her in a constant state of drunkenness.
Eventually she named her most notable client: Madame de Montespan. La Voisin claimed that Montespan had bought aphrodisiacs and performed black masses with her to gain and keep the king’s favor over rival lovers. There was no evidence beyond La Voisin’s confessions, and there were many inconsistencies in the testimonies. The lieutenant general of police, Gabriel Nicolas de la Reynie, who handled the scandal, noticed these inconsistencies, and it is likely that Montespan was likely innocent of the worst charges.
Many believed she had also conspired to poison the king, since her relationship with Louis had weakened while he showed interest in the Duchess of Fontanges. Some thought Montespan was ready to have him poisoned if Fontanges replaced her. Fontanges died in 1681, before a full liaison could blossom, and some suspected Montespan, though the death was likely natural. Further suspicion attached to Montespan through her maid, who was frequently connected to La Voisin.
The king was shocked by the accusations against the mother of his children. He ordered the testimony against her removed from the file, had anything against her refuted and hidden, and her accusers were secretly imprisoned for life. Montespan herself was never interrogated or confronted by her accusers. In the years that followed, she turned increasingly to charitable works.
She founded hospitals for the elderly and orphans, a boarding school for poor and orphaned girls, and a refuge for Paris’s most impoverished citizens. In 1691, she retired from court entirely and began a religious life in a convent in Paris. She was granted a pension of half a million francs, which she used largely for the good of others. She donated vast sums to hospitals and charities and was a generous patron of the arts.
The last years of her life were given over to severe penance. As a final act, she asked her estranged husband for forgiveness and begged him to rejoin her, but he refused. Strangely, before his death, he proclaimed his love for her and named her the executor of his estate. Madame de Montespan died on 27 May 1707, at the age of sixty-six, likely from heart disease.
In her final days, she passed in and out of consciousness and was short of breath. Before she died, she asked forgiveness of everyone. Her last word was “pardon.
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