Tea at Trianon: The Context of Henriette-Marie

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, April 22, 2024

The Context of Henriette-Marie

An insightful assessment of My Queen, My Love from Laura Crockett at The History Desk:

Henriette Marie married Charles I of England in 1625. She became his queen but was never crowned, formally. When she married Charles, she was 15. Our modern perspective tells us that is a mere girl. Nevertheless, previous ages were practical in these matters. Henriette died when she was 59. That too, is young in our eyes. Nonetheless, she lived to a ripe age, because the average, back in the day, was 35 years.
Vidal structures the story as one of those perfect circles, wherein she begins with Marie de Medici, Henriette’s mother, and then closes the story with Marie. What is given to us, in between the Marie sections, is the story of her daughter, who lived during a crucial development era in the history of the Western world.
Marie’s story is fascinating all on its own. Marie was an old maid of 25 before she was married. But what a marriage! Her guy was Henry IV, perhaps one of the smartest men to hold the French crown for centuries. His grandson was Louis XIV. But after that, for the French royal houses, it was all downhill. Marie was Henri’s second wife. Louis XIII, of Musketeer fame, was their first child. Henriette their last. When Henriette was still in infancy, her father was assassinated. That was an event that truly changed the trajectory of history. Henri would be considered a rather liberal thinker, in the traditional sense of the word; live, and let live. Indeed, the French coined the phrase, laissez faire; leave it alone. Wherein we get the phrase, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Henri gave us the Edict of Nance, which ended the religious wars in France. The essence of the Edict was toleration of the protestants, i.e., leave them alone. (Read more.)